


Redemption Lies Plainly in Truth

by masu



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Apocalypse, Blood and Gore, Brief Mark/Johnny, Copious Amounts Of Swearing, Enemies to Lovers, Family Loss, Guns, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, One-Sided Attraction, Past Taeyong/Johnny, Post-Apocalypse, Recreational Drug Use, Road Trips, Self-Discovery, Zombie Apocalypse, but main ship is markhyuck, of sorts lmao
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-12
Updated: 2020-12-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:55:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 24,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26962510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/masu/pseuds/masu
Summary: Three years after the beginning of the 'End of the World', Mark Lee is barely scrapping by as a smuggler in the collapsing and destitute San Francisco Quarantine Zone, living off rations and copious amounts of beer in attempts to avoid facing what haunts him.Desperate for the right moment to escape the city walls and fulfill a promise that was made with a dying breath, he agrees to join a delivery mission across the continental United States, escorting a spoiled, purple-haired brat named Lee Donghyuck to a secret rendezvous in New York City.Who knew that the man whose personal goal appears to be always being a massive pain in the ass, could somehow become absolution."Throw yourself into the unknown,With pace and a fury defiant.Clothe yourself in beauty untold,And see life as a means to a triumph."
Relationships: Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Mark Lee
Comments: 12
Kudos: 48





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction, based very loosely on the fictitious public personas of all individuals. In no way am I attempting to present a reality: none of these characters are in relationships in real life, I am not implying anything about their actual personalities, nor do I claim to know anything about or define their personal lives or thoughts. This is fake! Absolute fiction! Nonsense!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! Welcome! This is my first fic in a long, looonggg time, and one that's taken several months of brainstorming and planning to finally come to fruition. I never meant to have a first chapter of this length, but here we are 15,000 words and 38 pages later!
> 
> First, a disclaimer: This is a work of fiction, based on the fictitious public personas of all individuals. In no way am I attempting to present a reality: none of these characters are in relationships in real life, I am not implying anything about their actual personalities, nor do I claim to define their personal lives or thoughts. This is fake! Absolute fiction! Nonsense!
> 
> This work is heavily inspired by the Last of Us video games, but will differ significantly in all aspects. Please be warned that there is mentions of gore, violence, and character death throughout this work, as to be expected with a zombie au. I will do my best to begin every chapter with a content warning, and update the tags regularly. Ultimately, however, this story is far more about the people than the zombies, so expect that to be present only as much as necessary.
> 
> Unfortunately, it just wasn't plausible or even feasible for me to include every member of NCT in this work. As this story is set in a post-apocalyptic United States, it just didn't make sense to somehow transport 23 kpop idols across the Pacific.
> 
> A lot of this story, however, is still not planned out, so things may change and tags may change as we go! It's gonna be a journey for all of us.
> 
> This chapter is entirely Mark focused, providing exposition for the world and the details of the apocalypse. Honestly, we're not even in San Francisco yet, but I promise we'll see Donghyuck soon! There is also some gratuitous stylistic use of lyrics from the hymn 'Amazing Grace', but I doubt that will be a regular feature of this work as a whole. Also, I have tragically never been to Vancouver or anywhere on the West Coast, so please excuse any possible geographical errors. Google Maps and I tried our best, with a little bit of creative license.
> 
> Final note: I can't exactly promise when this will be updated. I'm currently a college student trying to juggle classes and work, and I am a notoriously slow writer. I will do my best to get something out soon, but it may be another massive word drop or something much shorter. I promise it will be updated! I'm currently estimating around five chapters, but it will probably end up being more.
> 
> The title comes from the song 'Achilles Come Down' by Gang of Youths!
> 
> Thanks for clicking, and thanks for reading all of this if you did. I hope you enjoy the first chapter, and if you did, please consider dropping a comment at the end!
> 
> Chapter TW: Gore, Blood, Violence, Minor Character Death

The drive to Seattle was silent, apart from the muffled weeping of the elderly ladies in the back of the bus and the roar of the engine which reverberated in Mark’s head, turning the thumping of the blood in his ears thick and sloppy with vibration until he felt submerged in at least a meter of water.

His mother had a tight, bruising grip on his hand, to the point where his fingers were so numb they were curling inwards towards his palm – but Mark didn’t push her off or pull away. Instead he sat still as she hummed hymns softly under her breath and stroked his knuckles, his forearm, the width of his shoulder, the crown of his hair, and lastly the bridge of his cheek. Mark could just about recognize the soft lilt of Amazing Grace, the way her lips gently formed around the words as she focused unseeingly upon his face. She was joined by a chorus of muttering from the others, until the song built into a softly sung but empty prayer, a worship desperate for a spiritual refrain. The lyrics drifted naturally into his mind, the result of years spent singing along to choirs and his father’s worn Fender acoustic.

* * *

_Through many dangers,_

_toils and snares I have already come,_

_'Tis grace has brought me safe thus far,_

_and grace will lead me home…_

* * *

Mark had just turned 17 before the apocalypse began. His birthday party had been on the previous Sunday, August 2nd – a celebratory church potluck with all the traditional dishes, banchan and Lay’s chips you could eat, finishing with a massive cake topped with vanilla whipped cream and candied strawberries. He posed for all the photos, let the old aunties pinch his cheeks and coo over him as much as they wanted, and refrained from cringing in embarrassment when he called up before the congregation by his father as he led them in all in prayer and song. His older brother Jacob held him in place with a firm hand clapped on his shoulder, chuckling at Mark’s mortification.

Later that night the sodas and cake had been exchanged for a couple of stolen beers and a large takeout pepperoni pizza down by the neighborhood skate park. His friends stuck a candle in a smushed candy bar, with Tristan and Jaeseok leading the loudest iteration of ‘Happy Birthday’ Mark had ever heard. They goofed off, tumbling into the half pipe, popping ollies, blasting their favorite songs so loud that neighbors shut their windows with shouts of annoyance. When the others went for a quick smoke behind the bushes, Sarah Choi from Youth Bible Study followed Mark into the bathroom and kissed him when he turned around in surprise. She let Mark trail his palm down the back of her denim skirt for a moment before slipping away, flashing bright eyes and a soft grin behind the flowing curtain of her thick black hair. He stumbled after her to the teasing whoops of the rest, laughter bubbling up through his chest and ringing through his ears as he laid down on the grass and watched her look away, a pretty blush spreading bashfully across her cheekbones as his ears burned garishly red.

He smiled up at the stars and thought to himself, _life couldn’t get better than this._

Ironically, it turns out he was right.

By Wednesday, there were the first reports of the ‘mystery illness’ spreading up through the Northern Hemisphere. People gossiped about the cause, blaming new street drugs and rotten cheap alcohol.

By Friday the following week, flights in and out of Canada were cancelled. The border crossings to the United States were shut, and businesses began to close their doors. Mark had one last hang out with his friends in his room, as several were leaving town to stay with family elsewhere to try and spend the rest of the summer vacation in as much peace as possible despite the uneasy circumstances. Sarah had hung back and kissed him one more time before climbing in to her family’s car, running her fingertips over his knuckles and promising to text Mark everyday. He watched them all drive off, and then went inside and blasted the Rap Top 100 from his speakers until his brother was hammering on his door, yelling at him to turn it down.

A month later, on September 14th, the city lines of Vancouver were shut, and all the residents were locked in.

Before the city closed, his mother had tried to keep things quiet by forcefully turning off news reports and the radio. It was obvious that it was equally to control her own fear as much as it was a protective motherly instinct, but she forgot to take Mark or his brother’s cellphones. His twitter feed was full of pleas for information on family and friends outside of quarantine zones, clickbait articles, and conspiracy theories. The worst of all were the short video clips of people around the world being attacked and chased, formerly human eyes flashing in the dark like a wild animal’s above snarling teeth. There was one clip from a user in Mexico of a shadowy man in an alleyway hunched over the body of a young woman. His fingers were clawing deep into her abdomen, the sickening sounds doubled with the keening wail ripping from his throat as he choked down chunks of guts and flesh. The person live streaming the footage stepped back anxiously and knocked something over – within an instant the man’s head turned, and the camera went dark. The video was taken down by Twitter soon after.

Mark never managed to go to sleep that night.

At first, before the isolation of Vancouver, his friends had texted frequently, Their group chat was filled with complaints, everyone whining about how bored they all were and wishing for the return of normalcy and the beginning of their senior year. Soon, however, the tone shifted to fear and confusion. The Prime Minister announced a plan to shore up city infrastructure and restrict inter-provincial travel – the last Mark heard from his friends was their plan to return to Vancouver.

The next day the military tanks rolled in, the refugee lines ebbed and swelled, and forty-eight hours later no more people were allowed in. Within the week the internet was shut off (supposedly to reduce the spread of misinformation), and cellphone connections beyond the city limits were discontinued. He didn’t hear from Sarah or the rest again.

For those within the walls, despite of all of chaos, life began to adjust. Schools reopened two months late that November, but instead of the thrilling senior year they had all originally planned, classes adjusted to uneasy silence and never ending reels of government propaganda. Mark's weekends were split between church services and sneaking out past midnight after the city curfew, running across rooftops and through alleyways with other fellow disillusioned teens, dodging flashlights and hiding from armed guard posts and police patrols.

Information about what was actually happening, about the virus or the rest of the world, was scarce – blocked and hidden in the name of conserving public calm. In a way, Mark felt he knew even less now than he did at the beginning. At least then he had his videos, his glimpses of the rest of the planet. With closed cities being designated as so-called ‘Quarantine Sectors’, the dream of going to college, much less travel anywhere ever again, was seemingly no longer possible. Instead, seniors were told to be prepared to be streamlined in to either ‘civilian service’ or military. At least with the military designation there was some chance of being allowed to go to the UBC campus down in University Hill, although the only available course of study was medicine for those smart and connected enough to possibly contribute to virus research and in turn keep themselves out of a combat zone.

_The Walking Dead come true, people possessed, zombies, monsters, living demons..._ there were dozens of names and theories as people attempted to rationalize the shit show of their new existence. Rumor was all anybody had outside the twice daily news reports, which only stressed that the situation was ‘under control’ by unified Canadian and American forces. There were always promises of some sort of cure, claims of a vaccine in the works. Fresh information broadsheets were posted weekly outside public offices, all stressing the same three points:

  1. _This is a global health emergency. Response is dictated by the Canadian National Board of Public Health and the Canadian Armed Forces._

  2. _The virus’s spreading mechanism is unknown. It is believed to pass through bodily fluids._

  3. _Infected individuals show increased aggression, lack of reasoning, and tendency for extreme violence. Avoid at all costs. Report any suspected cases to authorities immediately._




His brother had been one of the first from their neighborhood forcefully drafted into the military, having been sent home permanently from his university in Toronto. On his biweekly home visits from his barracks, he told a far different story than the one Mark felt coerced to swallow.

* * *

“Shit’s getting fucking worse there, Mark... the city government doesn’t know anything. Hell, even the military doesn’t know anything.”

Jacob was sitting on Mark’s windowsill, still dressed in his iron pressed fatigues. He was taller than Mark by several inches, enough that his head of cropped dull black hair had to be tilted out one side of the window, unable to rest comfortably against the sill. Smoke curled out from between the cracks in his teeth as he took another drag on his cigarette, tapping the ashes out against the fire escape and exhaling into the chilly March sky. The dim light of Mark’s bedside lamp reflected warmly across the silver cross peeking out from between Jacob’s collarbones.

By reflex, Mark rubbed a thumb over his matching pendant, chewing on the thin, cheap chain. 

Dinner that evening had been uncomfortable and tense. The meal, only stale rice and sour fish, grew cold as their mother quietly wept “Joonhyung...” over her plate and their father stared stone faced at his eldest son’s uniform and shorn hair. Jacob had received new orders – there were plans from the higher ups to attempt to expand the city limits into some of the surrounding suburbs. The authorities claimed that the neighboring towns and the entire province were supposedly safe. Everyone else knew otherwise. What would be the point then of the border walls, the barbed wire, the guards?

Mark snorted. “Yeah, as if things could get anymore shit.” He paused, wrinkling his nose at the heavy smell of tobacco creeping in and staining his already molding walls. “I wish you wouldn’t smoke so much.”

Jacob ignored him. “There’s no one giving orders anymore. The phone lines to Ottawa went dead two months ago–the last communication at all was from Edmonton three weeks back, and it was a SOS. No one could understand it, just someone shouting meaningless bullshit before the line was cut. Nothing from anyone official. For all we know, we could be the only ones left.” He stubbed out his cigarette, tossing the butt down the five stories from their apartment to the ground.

“People don’t come back from assignments beyond the boundaries. They’re going to throw me out there for God knows how long, watching other units try to clear up through Coquitlam and possibly into Surrey, as if any legit defense could be set up across the river. And why are we bothering? What crap are we protecting, Mark?”

Mark sat still and unresponsive on the end of his bed, shrugging while looking down and picking at the beds of his fingernails. Outside his room, the apartment was now silent, the mood still somber even as his brother visibly raged. He could almost feel his mother praying fervently in her room, attempting to cope with the evening’s announcement.

He hadn’t told his parents yet about the draft papers handed out in class the week prior. His designation had been chosen for him – as soon as he graduated, like his brother, he would be placed in his own dark green camouflage and thrown out like zombie fodder.

“There’s no reason to do it. The rich assholes are just sick of living in the city with the rest of us. They miss being able to go golf and look down on the rest of us from their mansions up in the mountains.They’re just lucky there haven’t been any cases inside the city yet. Once some useless face-eater wanders in, this whole system will blow up. People aren’t going to lay around anymore.”

Mark bit down hard on the edge of his tongue and glanced up, a blunt ache beginning to build in his jaw and spreading up to his temples.

“What, you planning some kind of a revolution?” He tried to joke, lighten some of the uncomfortable tension that came with being so blunt about reality.

Jacob didn’t answer, not even cracking a little smile. He stared down at Mark’s face intensely, eyes unreadable beyond their ferocity.

“When all this is fucked, Mark, we’re leaving.”

Another beat of silence.

“Okay.”

Jacob softened, exhaling audibly through his nose; maybe he recognized the tension in Mark’s shoulders, the unease in his response. He lightened his posture, clearing his throat. “I miss Toronto, man. I miss everything before all this shit went down.”

He shifted forward, grabbing the edge of Mark’s skateboard where it leaned nearby against the wall. The corner of his mouth quirked upwards. When he looked at Mark now, his gaze was filled with endearment, tinged with evident nostalgia.

“You still go skating at all?”

Mark exhaled the thick breath trapped in his chest, thankful for the shift in subject. He nodded, leaning back on his hands. “Sometimes, yeah. Jaeseok and I were planning to go down tomorrow after class.”

“That’s good, that’s good.” Jacob gestured outwards with his hand in acknowledgement, a vague gesture of approval. “Jaeseok’s that little skinny guy, right? With the bad bleach job?”

Mark huffed, cracking a small laugh despite his mood. “Yeah, that’s him. Except he’s also got a perm now.”

Jacob raised an eyebrow, eyes wide with surprise. “How the hell did he get that?”

“His aunt works down at mom’s hair salon.”

“Does it look any better?”

“No.”

They grinned at each other, and Mark felt himself relax. This was more like old times, the way it used to be. Jacob back home on some break from school, the two talking shit into the early hours of the morning, being brothers. Mark had missed him; Jacob may be in Vancouver, but he felt farther away than he ever had before.

“I have a quick question for you. Who was that girl from last summer, the pretty one always wearing those butterfly earrings?”

And just like that, Mark felt his stomach roll, his mood darkening again. He coughed into his fist, his lungs once again feeling choked.

“Sarah. Sarah Choi.”

“Shit, that’s right! Sarah.” Jacob laughed, not sensing Mark’s sudden discomfort with the subject. “She was hot, man! You talk to her anymore?”

Mark went back to picking at his nails. A bead of blood welled fresh near the torn cuticle of his left thumb.

“No. I, uh, haven’t heard from her.”

“What, you scare her off? You didn’t gross her out, right? Kissing like a dead fish?” Jacob nudged Mark’s foot teasingly, making a mocking smooch sound with his lips pursed tight. Mark didn’t react.

“No. She,” Mark coughed again, pausing to force down the knot in his throat, “She’s been gone since the beginning. Left town. Didn’t make in before the walls closed.”

“Oh.”

Jacob shut his mouth quickly, turning to stare back out the window. Nothing ruins a mood more than a probably-dead not-even-girlfriend. They sat in silence for a few minutes, until Jacob, seemingly given up, yawned audibly.

“It’s getting pretty late. I should probably go to sleep.”

Mark nodded, forcing down any twinges of disappointment or feelings of being cast aside. “Ah, yeah. Alright then.”

Jacob stood, turning towards the door and running his fingers through Mark’s hair as he passed. Mark watched him go, trepidation bubbling in his throat. Unable to stop himself, he called out after him.

“Wait, hyung...” His voice was high, petulant, and reedy, cracking on the last syllable. Jacob paused in the doorway, tilting his head to look back at Mark.

“Hm?”

“Be safe, yeah? Come back.”

Jacob’s shoulders dropped. He reached up and pulled his necklace off over his head, pooling the chain in his hand and holding it out towards Mark in an open palm. Mark took it with shaking fingers.

“Until I come home, keep this safe for me.”

* * *

_The Lord has promised good to me,_

_His Word my hope secures;_

_He will my Shield and Portion be,_

_As long as life endures._

* * *

Jacob left the city two days later, and his family never heard from him again.

After a month of nothing, they received an official notice that contact with his unit had entirely ceased. All personnel were missing in action and presumed dead. Mark stood in the freezing spring rain in front of City Hall, being delicately handed a folded Canadian flag as if the scrap of cheap cloth had any real value.

As if it could replace the entire life of a dead brother.

His mother shook behind him, having run out of tears – for once, his Pastor of a father had nothing eloquent to say. They were one of eight families being ‘honored’ that day, shuffled across a plywood stage to the recorded sound of saluting rifle fire. His father was handed a certificate printed on yellowing A4 paper, placed inside a plastic frame.

__

_In honor of their dedication and ultimate sacrifice for their fellow citizens..._

__

** _JACOB ‘JOONHYENG’ LEE_ **

__

_Has been posthumously awarded the Royal Canadian Golden Medal of Merit._

They couldn’t even spell his fucking name right.

That night Mark sat on his window sill. A cigarette was clutched tight between his front teeth, two small metal crosses rested in the hollow of his throat, and in his fingers he spun a lighter, with which he set fire to his draft papers. He watched, mesmerized, as the flame licked up the pages and turned the words to ash. Once the black ink of his name had melted away, he tossed the smoldering remains, and the implications behind them, out through the pouring rain into dark oblivion.

Everything, if it was even possible, grew worse after that.

April 12th was the first recorded case within the city walls. A group of teens from the neighborhood of Granview-Woodland, all a year younger than Mark, had snuck out through the Hastings-Sunrise section of the fence overnight – a girl wandered away for just a moment to take some photos of the stars across the water, and had been attacked. Her screams brought all of her friends and a couple of infected, who turned the street into a bloodbath. Only one made it home.

He surrendered himself to the border guard, who having recorded his story, made the critical mistake of allowing the boy to go home with his anxious parents for the evening to rest. They had failed to notice the small mark above his ankle bone, one tooth from one roamer having only just punctured his skin. By sunrise he had apparently ravaged his entire family, and was found roaming the streets drenched in blood with his eyes rolled back in his skull.

The neighborhood was immediately quarantined, but it was no use. Within days there was another incident, this time with several roamers breaking through a hole in the southeastern fence. They had been spotted on security cameras crossing the boundary but somehow remained at large for an entire day, sending the whole city into a spiral of terror until they were found and exterminated.

Parents also began to protest the drafting of their eighteen year old children as the end of the school year grew closer, and rations grew so tight that food rations, electricity hours and water access began to be separated by several days rather than hours. The flood of refugees before the city closed had created a massive housing crisis, which had only gotten worse as rich landlords continued to enforce rent payments on newly unemployed families. As a result, even more people dared to sneak beyond the boundaries to survive, creating a black market of goods stolen from abandoned homes and businesses while at the same time leading to the spreading of cases within the city. Neighborhoods began to be divided by physical fences, not just names, with armed checkpoints blocking each turn. Citizens started to insult the city leadership, criticize military overreach, and challenge the positions of power held by the wealthy elite who remained shacked up in luxury downtown penthouses. The first large protest had been organized by another church downtown, full of cardboard signs and families with children, being led by an acquaintance of Mark’s dad – the military responded by opening fire. Protests subsequently grew more intense, disorder and disillusion rampant, until a ban was placed on any unapproved private or public gatherings. The promises of protection afforded by the military against the dangers outside of the city’s boundaries less than a year prior were quickly morphing into authoritarian control.

Muggings and violence in the streets grew increasingly common and anyone who dared step outside after the official curfew was either beaten beyond recognition where they stood, or completely vanished off the face of the earth. There were rumors those who disappeared were being forcefully pressed into service, given the dangerous task of guarding the walls or continuing with the fool's errand of expansion. Families of those missing or killed outside the walls in unknown circumstances were completely left in the dark regarding the fates of their loved ones. Funerals were held with no body to mourn, with thousands of missing posters hung by desperate mothers knowing that a return of their loved one was nearly impossible.

Mark’s church began to overflow with new people, their tiny space crammed next to a rundown laundromat, which had never felt too small before, often filled beyond capacity. Total strangers pressed together and shared candles and blankets, clutching the hands of those around them. His dad led daily sermons, pleading for peace, calling for love, and trying to inspire hope.

The look in his eyes didn’t match his honeyed words. A photo of Jacob was freshly taped inside the front cover of his bible, smudged with reverent and grieved fingerprints. His beloved guitar sat to the side of the pulpit untouched.

Mark continued to lie about his draft papers. His mother had somehow convinced herself that having lost one child, the higher ups had looked upon their family with pity. Mark must’ve been assigned to civilian service, where he’d soon be put to work fixing bridges and patching holes, never ever having to wear those hideous fatigues...despite the fact that Mark hadn’t shown her a single form saying so.

He had, however, received two more notices of his upcoming enlistment date. Those, like the first, were unceremoniously burned and sacrificed to the night sky.

For some time, Mark tried to convince himself that Jacob was, possibly, still alive. On lonely nights the loss turned his heart numb, and all he could do for relief was curl up on his brother’s bed, staring at the photos tacked onto the walls of a life that was once happy, joyful, and safe. His dreams were twisted and hazy visions of celebrated homecomings, nightly hallucinations where he’d open his eyes and his brother would be standing above him smiling, arms spread to welcome an embrace and laughter booming in his chest.

Then he’d wake, seeing nothing but a cracked ceiling and hearing nothing but oppressive silence. He’d replay their last night together in his head, and the statement that now rang true.

_“People don’t come back from assignments beyond the boundaries.”_

_Fuck you Jacob._ He would think to himself, crumpling photos he angrily ripped off the walls in his palms.

_You promised it wouldn’t happen to you._

His delusions and visions of grand gestures of conscientious objection couldn’t last forever. The deadline for his enlistment came and passed. A few days later, in the middle of the night, there was a loud knock at the door.

Electricity had been shut off on their block for 48 hours, so Mark’s father stumbled to the front door with only a cheap flashlight in his hand. Despite his calls of acknowledgement, the harsh banging didn't cease. Mark, having not been asleep to begin with, sat on the floor with his door cracked wide enough for one eye to peer down the hallway towards the entrance. Two members of the military guard, one in ceremonial dress, the other in riot gear, stood unsmiling in the hallway even as his dad attempted a friendly, but wary, greeting.

“Good evening, Officers.”

The man in the fancy uniform pursed his lips, looking down at his father’s wrinkled bathrobe and patchy beard with little respect. His severely tight face and furrowed brow seemed a sharp contrast to the cheerful tiny maple leaf pin studding his collar.

“Is this the residence of Dongmin Lee?”

His father’s grip on the door tightened. He shifted uneasily on his feet.

“Yes, that would be me. Pardon me, sir, but it’s the middle of the night–”

“Your son is,” The officer cut him off, looking down at a clipboard held in his hand, “Mark _Min-hong_ Lee, correct? He is currently living here?”

He mispronounced Mark’s name, rolling it in his mouth like a bad taste. His dad faltered for a moment. Mark saw his hands flex in to fists.

“Yes, he is.”

“Your son has not reported for his mandatory enlistment date at Regional Precinct 23. Should he not present himself to authorities for intake and basic training by June 25th, he will be treated as a deserter and prosecuted to the full extent of the law.”

“Wait...enlistment?” His father stuttered. “We’ve received no orders!”

“Yes, enlistment.” The officer’s upper lip curled, clearly perceiving this response as mock ignorance. “Your son has received multiple notifications.”

His father was too struck dumb to respond. The two officials stepped back from the door into the hallway, glancing disdainfully at the curling wallpaper and chipping paint of their building.

“I’d make sure you get him down to the precinct. You’ve lost one son in service already, correct? Best not to lose another in far less honorable circumstances.” He tipped his hat, the second stranger casually rested his palm on the gun in his holster, and the two left silently back the way they came.

Once their footsteps had faded away, his father slammed the door shut, resting his forehead on the cracked wood and inhaling several deep, shaky breaths.

His mother appeared from their bedroom, her steps shuffling and unnerved. The fresh grays in her hair glowed ghostly in the moonlight.

“Who was it? What were they saying?”

Dongmin turned, sliding his glasses down off of his nose, rubbing his palm across his face. Since losing Jacob, he had grown tired – now, Mark could barely recognize him. He seemed twenty years older. He didn’t respond, and Mark’s mother’s voice grew higher and more anxious.

“What did they want? Why were they talking about Minhyung? What do they want with him?”

His dad glanced over in Mark’s direction. Mark slid the door shut another inch. He looked away.

“They’re taking him, aren’t they? They’re going to take him? They can’t do that, they can’t take him. I can’t lose another one, I can’t lose him!” His mother burst forth a storm of rapid Korean, Mark having to strain to understand the words. She was quickly growing hysterical, shuddering and clawing at her own face. His father slumped back farther against the wall, seeming moments away from a similar collapse.

However, his shoulders suddenly stiffened, his spine straightened, and when he looked up there was a new steely resolve in his eyes. He grabbed his wife’s shoulders, holding her still out of her fervor.

“They aren’t enlisting him, Haejung. We’re leaving.”

She froze.

“We’re what?”

“ _We’re leaving_. We’re taking Mark and we’re getting out of here.”

“Wha–where? Where else can we go?”

“It doesn’t matter where, Haejung...this can’t be the last city left on this damn continent! I’m not, I’m not-”

He paused. Mark had seen his father cry before. Happy tears, sad tears, compassionate tears, tears that were forced by non-stop laughter. However, he’d never seen these tears before – ones of desperation, pain, _fear_... for the first time since his brother’s disappearance, Mark saw his father break.

“I’m not letting them take him. Not again. I’ll talk to Brian in the morning. He has connections with some of the smuggler rings, he may have heard of another community or sector or _something_. We can take the church bus, gather up enough to last us for a while, bring some others with us...we can go south! There’s got to be another city somewhere.”

“But leave Vancouver, leave home…”

“This isn’t our home anymore.” His voice was solid and resolute.

“What about Jacob? What if he comes back...we need to be here…”

“Haejung...he won’t be coming back. He’s gone.”

His mother’s shoulders curled in impossibly smaller. The shoe had dropped. The inevitable was just that – the inevitable.

“They won’t tolerate any more delay. We’ll have to be gone by the end of the week. Do you understand?”

She nodded, breath still hitching.

“Should we wake up Minhyung?”

“No.” His dad glanced at his door again. Mark slid farther back into his room. “It’s the middle of the night. Let him sleep. We’ll talk about it in the morning. Let’s go to bed.” He guided his wife back to their room, an arm wrapped around her quivering shoulders. Once their door quietly clicked shut, Mark rose from the floor, and stood mute in shock. A foul breeze drifted through his window. A dog barked a block away, and yelped once before it went silent. His life was here. His home was here.

Home had never felt so foreign.

Time moved quickly after that. Mark’s days were spent sorting through their belongings with his mother, picking which few items they would bring and which to leave behind forever. They worked silently, maintaining the outward illusion of normalcy. His father went throughout his daily routines, his sermons, greeting neighbors with a wave and a smile. At night he spoke on the phone for hours, clarifying details, building connections, and getting information. After the third night, he greeted Mark and his mother in the morning with unusually bright eyes.

“Seattle. That’s where we’ll go. It’s ridiculously close, at most a three hour drive, maybe even less. Brian’s got word it’s being called a ‘Sanctuary City’. He knows a guy named Miguel who’s managed to tap in to radio transmissions from outside the boundaries. There’s an open call for refugees – anyone who can hear it is welcome.”

“Seattle? What, is America safer?” His mom asked, clutching a mug of lukewarm tea between her hands. Mark hadn’t seen her take one sip.

“It can’t be any worse than it is here. Mark? What do you think?” They both turned expectantly in his direction.

Mark wasn’t used to giving his opinion. No, rather, he wasn’t used to his opinion being of any equal standing. If Jacob was still here, he would’ve stepped into this role, been the other shoulder for their father, organizing everything. Mark would’ve been allowed to remain the youngest, to go along and let the tough decisions be made for him. He felt nervous, uncomfortable, and unanchored.

He cleared his throat, nodding vigorously. “I mean, yeah. It’s a start, I guess.”

“Yes, it’s a start.” His dad looked exhausted. “We can bring some people with us. They’d have to keep quiet though. Maybe some of those in the congregation, those most vulnerable…”

His mother visibly recoiled. “What? _Choose people_?”

“We have to. We can’t bring everyone Haejung, it’s a small bus, there’s 200 people! We can tell the others where to find us, leave a note on the message board...”

“Just leave everybody behind? Dongmin, you know that Sunghoon and Chanhee’s baby will be born any day now. Jaeseok, Adam and Elijah will have to enlist just like Minhyung, if they haven’t already...they’re like sons to me, I’ve known their mothers for years, you can’t possibly be _serious_ –”

“ _ **Enough!**_ ’

His father slammed his fist on the table, his mother going silent with her mouth hanging wide in shock. Mark remained mute, shook dumb by the realization that was just dawning on him now. Leaving the city wouldn’t just mean abandoning belongings. It would mean leaving behind the rest of his friends, everyone he knew, everyone who knew him.

“We can’t think like that anymore, alright? We have to think about _ourselves_ , Haejung. The only people who matter to me are you and Mark. I want to help everyone, I wish we can bring everyone. These people trust me, I’m supposed to be the leader... I don’t want to leave them more than you. But the authorities are coming. If we stay, if someone gossips about our plans, they will take him. _That will not happen_.”

His father stood, rubbing at his temples as he marched off, muttering under his breath about everything else he had left to do. His mother went to dump the tea in the sink, looking nauseous. The conversation ended there.

In the end, they each ended up with one large bag. His mother’s was filled with ziploc bags full of photographs and keepsakes, his father’s with documents and sermon notes. Mark’s was full of nothing but clothes, his backpack stuffed with the real mementos – a couple of polaroids of his friends, a ratty moleskine notebook where he’d write shitty rap lyrics. A single photo of him and Jacob. It was strange, seeing the bags sitting in the middle of the living room floor, while the rest of the apartment looked exactly the same. The only give away of something suspicious were the empty frames on the walls. Jacob’s room and belongings were left untouched.

The chosen few and willing to go gathered in the church – a few older aunties with no children left to look after them, the families with the youngest kids, all lured by promises and claims of finding a new apocalyptic utopia, no matter how sugarcoated and unsubstantiated. Mark had begged and subsequently been allowed to ask Jaeseok and his family to come, but by the time he arrived on their front stoop, he was too late. Jaeseok had already been sent to basic training, and Mark never got to say goodbye.

They moved the church bus under the cover of early morning, bribing dawn shift border guards with ration cards and a story about moving the vehicle to be scrapped in a military junkyard before the day’s work began. They hid baggage and supplies underneath the floor panels and benches, draping blankets to hide any evidence. His father had traded their flat screen for a small handgun, which he slipped under the driver’s seat. His eyes had dared Mark to say anything, but he only nodded in response.

They parked in an abandoned lot that was right across the Fraser River from the old airport. There were only two rows of security fences blocking British Columbia Highway 99 and the bridge across into Richmond, and the route was so rarely visited by border patrols it was almost assured as a smuggler safe zone.

The plan was to travel as a group the following morning, under the cover story of attending a service at a fellow church across the city. His father hoped that the presence of so many elderly and children would lower accusations of illegal activity. By noon, they would supposedly be across the bridge and gone with none the wiser.

They left their apartment that evening for the last time. Mark stood in the middle of Jacob’s room, watching the dust floating idly through the air. A fine layer had already begun to settle upon every object, childhood knickknack and tacky poster. Faces in photos were obscured, now barely recognizable. He laid his skateboard, wheels up, on Jacob’s bed. He turned off the light. He shut the door forever.

Everyone stayed in the church overnight, but sleep evaded them all. They left at 8 am sharp, a misshapen crowd nervous on their feet. Every block passed caused a spike in anxiety amongst them all; babies wailed and children clutched close to their parents’ legs.

Something seemed immediately off. The entire city’s atmosphere seemed on edge, even more than usual, yet at the same time deathly still. Despite it being Friday morning, absolutely nobody was in the streets. Curtains were drawn and doors resolutely locked. His father looked confused. Mark felt as if he were about to jump out of his skin.

They reached the first checkpoint. It was completely empty.

The group slowed to a stop. Mark heard people muttering, his mother’s grip on his elbow tightening. What was usually a bustling gate filled with military personnel and a huge line of ragged laborers trying to cross zones for work was instead silent.

Mark pushed his mom’s hand off and stepped forward first, approaching the guard shack and peering in through an open side window. There was a half-eaten granola bar resting on a small desk, several papers spread out across its surface that were only partially signed. An old office chair, filthy and covered with duct tape, laid on its side as if knocked over in a hurry. He could hear a soft buzzing, like mechanical static – there was a handheld radio on the floor, halfway kicked under a filing cabinet. The door was locked, so he climbed in through the window, leaning down to pick the radio up. He fiddled with the tuning knob until finally the interference was muddled with a human voice, cutting in and out of reception. Mark lifted it to his ear.

_“.....More units needed….wall breach...spreading….zone number…..compromised...fucking shit!”_

His breath hitched in his chest, painfully seizing against his ribs. Wall breach?

There was a small television mounted in the top right corner of the booth. Mark stretched on his toes to turn it on, increasing the volume. At this time in the morning, the first of the two daily newscasts was supposed to be airing – instead, there was a blue screen with the emblem of the military service emblazoned in the middle. Above it read ‘EMERGENCY’ in large flashing letters, and an automated voice bellowed, chilling Mark’s blood stone-cold.

_“Attention all citizens. Do not panic. This is a level five alert. Remain indoors until the all clear siren sounds. Attention all citizens. Do not panic–”_

They had all slept in the church, meaning they missed the emergency broadcast. No wonder the city seemed abandoned. Fuck. Fuck fuck shit, fucking _hell_.

“Holy shit, Dad!” Mark leaned out the window, frantically waving his father over. Dongmin rushed over, clearly concerned, but his reaction was nothing compared to the sheer look of unnerve that washed over his face as Mark gestured up to the television.

Mark also showed him the handheld, which was now dead silent. Blinking on the screen was a new notification - _Connection Lost_. “There was a radio transmission too. It mentioned a wall breach, but not where. Whoever it was, they were calling for more reinforcements.”

His father was silent, lips pressed together as he furrowed his brow contemplatively. “We’ll keep going. Maybe this will be good for us, if the checkpoints are all empty.”

“But, the breach–”

He cut Mark off cold. “We’ll pray it’s at the western end of the peninsula. If anything, it’ll keep the military preoccupied until we’re long gone. We keep moving.” He turned to gesture forward the rest of the group. “Let’s hurry up!”

The walk would normally have taken two hours, but they hurried, pressed forward by growing unease and anxiety. Every neighborhood was quiet, every street abandoned. Even the security cameras mounted in the mouths of every alleyway didn’t follow them, instead dangling from their rigs as if the whole city-wide surveillance system had been deactivated.

They had just made it into the quieter residential streets of Oakridge, the city skyscrapers replaced by shabby single family homes and decrepit convenience stores, when chaos finally set in.

A middle-aged man, gaunt and balding with a pair of impossibly wide and bloodshot blue eyes came staggering from the opposite direction, panting as if he had been sprinting. He was clutching his right shoulder, the arm attached hanging uselessly as red spurted between his fingers. Upon spotting them, he began to speed up until he was stumbling into a run.

Several people screamed, the group pushing together and lurching to the side to get away from him. But rather than stop and attack anyone, the man ran right by, barely sparing a glance. He shouted as he passed, his voice raspy and guttural.

“They’re _here_! They’re coming!” 

Mark barely had time to make eye contact with his father, a rod of pure fear jolting through his gut, before suddenly the piercing roar of the neighborhood’s emergency sirens began ripping through the air. The shock of the noise had him bending over and clutching at his ears in desperation for the ringing to stop, the man’s hysterical warning completely washed out. Once the pain subsided, there was a new current of sound barely detectable underneath the monotonous siren – screams, wails, the sounds of a massive crowd in abject terror, all coming from the direction the man was running from and building louder. The direction they were meant to be going.

In his head, Mark did a quick recalculation of their route, desperate to find some way they could avoid whatever the _fuck_ was happening further south, but any possibility would just mean a longer walk and a larger chance of something going horribly wrong. Everyone else seemed to come to the same conclusion.

“We’ll split into two groups and move together _silently_. Stick to side streets and alleyways, keep within eyesight of each other, and meet at the bus. Stay away from any crowds, do not draw attention to yourselves, do not tell anyone else where you are going.”

For all the mayhem, however, Mark couldn’t identify any danger. The streets were progressively filled with more and more people running, screaming, pounding on doors begging to be let inside, but there was no sign of whatever was causing this hysteria. Soldiers on mass were absent, but Mark began to notice more and more individuals amongst the crowd in solid black riot gear with helmets missing and armor pieces hanging apart at the seams.

His group moved across the grain, crossing diagonally through the streams of people running towards downtown. Every house was emptying, every apartment building abandoned as anyone left unaware or sleeping was kicked in the ass by communal terror.

After what felt like an eternity of jogging and forcing his heart back down into his chest as it threatened to burst from his throat, they finally reached their turn and broke away from the horde. There was a brief moment of ease as Mark recognized that the imminent threat was coming from farther east at the turn, and not south from the direction of the bridge. He could just make out the outline of the old airport's air traffic control tower in the distance, as well as the blue horizontal haze of the river.

The finishing rush to the first row of fences seemed to take a minute and an hour at the same time, but Mark let out a breath of relief upon noticing that his group was not the first to arrive, his father and a couple others already at work pulling apart the first fence so they all could pass through. The bus was right where they had left it – all that was left to do was to refill the tank with some more siphoned gasoline to ensure no need for any stops.

They had just passed through when there was a chorus of desperate shouting behind them. Mark spun around to see, to his horror, a steady stream of other people running towards them. Their group must have been noticed as they split off, with some in the crowd deciding to follow them rather than the majority... And now, with the bus in plain sight, they were confirming the desperate hope for a way out.

Panicked, they slammed the fence shut again, twisting bars together and tying thick knots in the ropes hung around the rungs. Mark was violently shoved back and pushed towards the bus with the rest, tripping over his feet. He could hear the rising crescendo of sound and pain behind him, the metallic shaking of the steel rings as the structure groaned under the new weight of dozens. He managed to twist himself free, turning around to shout at his father to hurry up and run with them, when he was struck still to the bone.

There was a hand on the fence. A small, delicate hand, one of a young child, right under a pair of huge, unblinking doe-like brown eyes with the pupils blown dark with fear.

The air continued to fill with frantic noise, someone was pulling on his arm so hard the bone felt as though it was about to rip out of its socket, and those eyes had bored straight into his, chilling him to the soul and locking his joints in place.

“Minhyungah- Minhyung...please, we have to go!” He could hear his mother whimpering to his left, tugging on his arm urgently as the bus behind them roared to life and the fence in front of them shuddered, tipping dangerously and then, at a far corner down, toppling. More and more people began to pour in through the gaps, rushing the bus at breakneck speed with some even frothing at the mouth in panic. The hand he had been fixated on, as well as the eyes attached, vanished under the crush of bodies as more people, seeing portions of the fence begin to fall, threw themselves viciously at the links.

You could hear it before you could see it - the cause of this terror, the rising chorus of guttural rumbling twisting into ripped yowls, the shuffling of heavy limbs across the pavement turning in to flat out sprints. The crowd heard it too, and if all hell hadn’t broken loose yet, it certainly did in that moment. Screams turned blood-curdling, from those of merely desperate people into those dying in the back, being pulled apart at the seams in the frenzy.

He knew he should be running, he knew he should already be on the bus, instead of glued in place staring down death like he’s only just having his epiphany about its inevitability. He felt cold, shaken to the core with the realization of how useless, how meaningless his life was. Why even run at this point? If Vancouver were laid to waste, what was to say the rest of the known world wasn’t the next on the list? Here was his generation’s nuclear war, but the end wasn’t a theory or a distant threat. It was here. There was no way to come back from this. Why try? Why run-

There was a burst of searing pain across his face, his cheek prickling with ice-cold needles and his nose stinging. Mark’s lungs immediately gasped for air, and with the burst of ozone in his chest he felt his eyes clear, focusing directly on his father’s face which was contorted in anger and a flash of fear. For a moment, Mark could’ve sworn he saw Jacob instead. He heard his brother’s voice echo in his head loud and clear–

_What the fuck are you doing, dumb ass? Get on the fucking bus!_

And just like that, his latent survival instinct kicked back into gear, and he stumbled forward over dragging feet in a sprint towards the bay doors, pushing his mother up the steps in front of him. He yanked the doors shut, his dad slamming his foot on the gas just as the last of the fence came crashing down and the tarmac completely flooded.

A few people had made it to the doors just as they had shut, banging on the glass and pleading as the vehicle began to lurch away. Fingers desperately clawing against the sides and windows left traces of dirt and blood from torn skin, painting the light pouring inside a faint red. Mark couldn’t help himself from looking back towards the crowd as they were fallen upon by the diseased. From this distance and without his glasses it was mostly a blur, but there was no mistaking the writhing masses and splattering of blood and fluids mixed with the tortuous wave of sound that not even the groaning of the bus could cover. This was the first time Mark had ever truly seen infected, and his stomach nearly flipped inside out.

As the bus finally left the chaos behind, turning onto Vancouver-Blaine Highway and south towards hopeful salvation, Mark sat completely still. He was losing feeling in his right hand, psalms and hymns were echoing emptily in his head, and the small Jesus figurine sitting on the dashboard held out its arms towards him, serene and cold. It seemed to be saying, with its nearly mockingly gentle and placating smile, _‘Well, you made it out. Good luck next time, kid!’_

The border crossing between the United States and Canada was completely unstaffed. The only thing blocking travel from either side was one plank of wood on each lane, which were easily moved and knocked aside. Like the suburban towns of Vancouver, those of Northern Washington state were equally empty. The dead streets of the cities of Bellingham and Marysville, and the ghost communities in between, were all equally unsettling for their sheer desolation.

The bus continued down long streets, uninterrupted, until suddenly the road became clogged with a massive amount of permanently static traffic. They were about thirty miles out of Seattle near the city of Marysville, according to the simple road map they used as their only source of direction, and the way forward was completely blocked by what appeared to be a never ending sea of rusty, abandoned vehicles.

His father grumbled in annoyance, slowing the bus to a halt and turning off the engine. He climbed out of the driver’s side door, wiping sweat off of his forehead with his wrist and motioning over his shoulder for Mark to follow. He forced his shaky legs to lock as he rose to his feet and stepped out of the bay entrance.

After both spent a couple of minutes puzzling over the map, squinting against the glare of the sun, it became obvious that there was no easy replacement route.

“We’ll have to try to clear the middle of the road – I think it’s possible then to be able to squeeze the bus through. Otherwise, we’ll have to walk the rest of the way.”

“That’s definitely impossible.” Mark hummed in agreement. Hopefully, the majority of off ramps and bridges would be the most clogged, and the rest clear enough that they could make it to Seattle’s boundaries by sunset. If not… Mark didn’t even want to imagine a sleepless night on the bus, jumping out of his skin at every noise and feeling like an easy roamer breakfast, essentially presented on a platter.

“Dongmin?”

There was a soft, elderly voice calling out to them from the bus – they turned to see Auntie Sooyeon leaning out of one of the windows, fanning herself feebly.

“Is there any chance we could find some more water? Chanhee’s getting thirsty, and with the heat inside here…”

“Of course, of course. We’ll stop by a gas station, see if there’s anything we can find.”

Another look down at the map showed a rest stop down an off ramp conveniently about a mile farther south. In actuality, the efforts to reach it took another hour of back breaking effort shoving rusted and creaky cars out of the way, the hot sun reflecting off the dark pavement and leaving Mark drenched in sweat and his hands covered in gritty oil.

His watch blinked _3:48 PM_ by the time they had finally reached the turn – sat on top of a bridge, looking down the descending ramp to the blurry, overgrown rest stop situated back in the trees. 

By now, the bus had to be turned completely off between each push forward to conserve the rapidly dwindling gas tank. Windows were opened all the way to ensure that the faint breeze could float in, a useless attempt to try to soothe the humidity sticking to their brows. It would’ve been a waste of time and valuable petrol to try to drive down to the stop, and daylight was wasting away. Plus, the highway had finally begun to seem to empty out ahead, the traffic having split down various off ramps as the main road for the last stretch to Seattle was blocked off by what seemed to be an abandoned military blockade.

“I can go down and grab some water.” Mark found himself offering, as the group stood around to organize their plans. The hours spent inside the tin can walls of the bus, coupled with the morning’s panic, were causing an uncomfortable itch under his skin, and a headache that pounded harder with every whimper and prayer someone muttered into the sickly humid air. Despite the danger, he was desperate for a moment alone. When his father leaned out of the driver’s side window to give him a slightly incredulous look, Mark shrugged. “It’ll be quicker than bothering to drive the bus down.”

“Alright, alright… Here, David and Sungho, go as well. Carry as much as you can. Everyone else, keep clearing the road until we reach the roadblock. Wait, Mark– here, take this.” 

His dad disappeared from view for a moment. He reappeared quickly and held the hidden handgun out of the window, offering the handle towards him. Mark took it after a moment’s hesitation, testing the weight of the weapon in his palm. The metal felt cold, slippery, and far too light for comfort. He gripped it in both hands, not daring even to brush the trigger. His father stared down, his mouth a thin, tight line.

“Hurry back.”

* * *

_Yea, when this flesh and heart shall fail,_

  
_And mortal life shall cease,_

  
_I shall possess, within the veil,_

  
_A life of joy and peace._

* * *

The station was, as it had appeared, entirely abandoned. As they cautiously approached, Mark could just make out the glinting shards of glass that littered the pavement from the shattered windows, interspersed between the scattered hoses strangely ripped from the pumps.

The shelves inside were all knocked over, collapsed like a row of dominoes. As they crept inside, Mark accidentally stepped on an old bag of Doritos, which deflated pitifully under his sneaker with a crunch. The dusty refrigerators lining the back wall were all unreachable, pinned shut by the displays.

“Fuck. This is gonna take longer than we thought.” Sungho swore to his left, kicking at a toppled cardboard cutout of Mr. Peanut. He’d been one of Jacob’s best friends, David as well. Both older than Mark, both running from the same fate he was, having abandoned their posts to catch the bus ride out. Mark slipped the gun into the side of his belt to free his hands, wiping the sweat on his palms off on his jeans.

“Might as well get started.” David sighed to his right, leaning down to begin pushing debris aside. “Mark, give me a hand with this first shelf. We can push it over to the right.”

“Got it.”

Sungho stepped back from the two of him, stretching his arms up above his head with a yawn. “You two work on that. I’m gonna go take a piss out back.”

“You better hurry the fuck up then. We’re not going to do all the hard work for you.”

“Yeah, yeah, shut it.” Sungho grumbled back, but gave them each a friendly whack on the shoulder as he left, glass crunching under his steps.

After about ten solid minutes of lifting and shoving shelves, they finally reached one section of the back wall. Mark yanked the door open, the hinge catching after almost a year of non use, but inside past the dust covered resin was just sparse rows of warm cans of Redbull and warped bottles of orange Gatorade.

“Crap.” David muttered, pulling out a bottle and inspecting it critically. The plastic had melted so much that the cap seemed to be fused on. “I doubt there’s any water left in this place at all.”

“At least it’s something.” Mark opined, grabbing one for himself. At that moment, three loud honks echoed down from the ramp. When Mark turned to peer out the window, he could just make out several pairs of waving hands gesturing down at them. “And it’ll have to do. They’re calling us back.”

“Fine. But if any of the aunties bitch about it…” David groaned, crouching to begin to fill his backpack with as many bottles as he could fit. “Here, Mark, finish filling this up. I’m going to see where that lazy ass went, leaving all this for us to do. No one has a bladder that big.” He stood and marched outside, shouting out into the air, “Sungho, you bastard, where the hell are you?”

Mark laughed in reply, kneeling down to replace David’s position. Once the bag was full, he zipped it closed and threw it over his opposite shoulder. A silver glint caught his eye, coming from a couple of chocolate bars hidden under a box to his right. Mark wasted no time shoving them into his own backpack. None of them had eaten since that morning, and Mark’s teenage stomach was threatening to gnaw through him.

“What the fuck- _Sungho_!”

David’s shout cut through the silence, panic clear in the volume of his tone. Mark jolted to attention, dashing out of the building and around the corner, chasing the sound of alarm.

David was staring out into the tree line, shoulders shaking. Mark had just opened his mouth to ask why he had screamed, when his eyes focused on a flurry of movement near the bushes.

Sungho was spread out flat on his back, gazing blankly up at the sky. His mouth hung open, unnaturally slack. Where his throat should’ve been was instead a gaping mass of torn tissue and gushing blood, one of his hands resting right below across his collarbone as if he had tried to cover the wound.

Three infected were crouched over his body, ripping into his skin with cracked nails through his torn shirt. Everything was red, the sickening squelch of tissue and the preening sound of the roamers flipping Mark’s stomach as they fed desperately on Sungho’s abdomen.

Several more were stalking deeper within the tree line, drawn by the scent of iron in the air. However, David’s shout had drawn their attention – several pairs of dead, glazed eyes turned in their direction, the roamers beginning to click their teeth in excitement.

Here was living food, here was _prey_. 

A common misconception is that zombies are slow and ambling. Tripping over their feet. No. Mark had seen the clips, had outrun a few roamers just that morning. They could sprint.

Mark became keenly aware of just how close he and David were to guaranteed death, and just how far they were from the safety of the bus. Even if both made a run for it, there’s no guarantee they’d not get caught. Besides, Mark wasn’t even sure if he could get his legs to move - he felt struck to the bone, his heart pounding in his chest all the way down to his locked knees. Sweat was running down his forehead and burning his eyes, but he didn’t dare to blink.

David was frozen as well, and for a moment, Mark had a desperate, fleeting hope that maybe, _just maybe_...if they stayed absolutely still, the roamers might overlook them, get distracted by a bird or something–

There was another loud burst of the bus horn behind them. It was loud enough to cause them both to jerk in shock, David’s head swiveling around to look at the rest up on the ramp subconsciously.

Fucking **SHIT**.

The zombies’ gazes narrowed in on them, growling viciously. Spit and saliva frothed at their mouths in excitement, jaws flexing in snapping bites of air. 

Mark reached out to grab David’s wrist, a fresh rush of adrenaline shocking his system back into full gear. He barely had time to open his mouth before he saw the first infected tense, before running straight for them.

“Run!”

They both scrambled backwards, pushing and clutching at each other’s shirts as they desperately sprinted back towards the highway, not even sneaking glances over their shoulders to judge the distance. Those back at the bus, having finally spotted the pending danger, were waving their arms and screaming for Mark and David to run faster, to hurry – if Mark had any breath to spare, he would’ve been shouting back _“Shut up!”_.

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see more motion in the trees and further down the highways in between the abandoned cars. They had driven straight into a horde’s path, and then stopped for _Gatorade_.

Mark made it to the base of the off ramp when he suddenly realized that David was no longer to his right. In his panic he hadn’t heard the other stumble – now that he had paused, he could hear the wretched wail of his name from behind him.

“ _Mark! Mark please, help me! Mark–_ ”

Mark spun around, just in time to watch as David, a solid 20 feet back and writhing around on the ground in fear, was crushed under the weight of one of their chasers. He screeched, the sound guttural and painfully primal.

Time seemed to slow down. Mark’s brain short circuited, his synapses firing nothing but white noise. In his panic, his fingertips brushed the handle of the gun, which was still tucked securely in his belt and long forgotten. He pulled it free, hands shuddering violently as he gripped the handle uneasily between slick palms. He tried to aim at the at least 200-pound man currently wrestling with David, but the barrel bobbed unsteadily.

If Mark missed, if the bullet was off by inches, he could accidentally shoot David instead. For some reason, in this moment of crisis, Mark had a vivid sense of deja vu of the only time he had ever shot a gun.

_“Mark, if you don’t focus you’ll end up hitting a squirrel instead of the can.” Jacob laughed, flicking him hard on the temple._

__

_“Well maybe if you stopped distracting me, I’d be able to focus better.” He bit in response, taking a step back to readjust his stance. His heel came down straight on the toe of Jacob’s boot, his brother gasping in pain and punching in reflex between Mark’s shoulder blades._

__

_“Christ, Mark!”_

__

_“Sorry, sorry!” Mark spun around, eyes wide, the gun still pointing up between them._

__

_“Stop! Jesus, don’t just point that around Mark, you’ll shoot somebody.” Jacob spun him back around quickly, pushing the barrel aside with his palm._

__

_Jacob was home on his first home leave after boot camp. Along with his fresh haircut and pair of fatigues, he had been assigned a brand-new handgun as well. Granted, it wasn’t apparently meant to leave the barracks unless leased out on assignment, but Jacob snuck it out to show off and rope Mark into an impromptu lesson with a couple of old Sprite cans in the alleyway out back._

__

_“Alright, let’s try this again. Always hold it with both hands, your dominant high on the grip, and the other on the underside of the barrel. Arms straight, eyes level – why are you squinting like that?”_

__

_“Huh?_

__

_“You’re squinting, dumb ass… open your left eye!” Jacob laughed. Mark forced both eyes open, furrowing his brow._

__

_“I don’t like that. It seems blurrier.”_

__

_“It’s not supposed to be. This is your fault for never wearing your glasses. Always have both eyes open.”_

__

_“It’s blurrier for me!”_

__

_“Fine then, squint. If you accidentally shoot someone because you’re scrunching your nose up and squinting, then it’s not my fault.” Jacob placed his hands on Mark’s shoulders, strong and anchoring._

__

_“Make sure the target, and only the target, is in your line of fire. Breathe, and then shoot.”_

__

_Breathe._

__

_Shoot._

__

_In that dirty alleyway, an old Sprite can exploded into shrapnel, pieces ricocheting off the surrounding brick walls._

In an overgrown gas station parking lot, nothing happened. The gun remained cold and silent.

The safety was still on.

In that split-second of human error and indecision, the roamer bit down hard directly on the junction of David’s neck and shoulder, tearing off a massive chunk of skin and muscle and creating a gushing geyser of hot arterial blood that drenched them both in an instant. The stream soon poured down onto the cracked concrete, filling the cracks and running towards Mark’s sneakers like a vapid premonition.

David’s scream died down into a bubbling, choking groan, more blood spilling out from the cracks between his teeth and down his chin as his vocal cords were flooded. He feebly punched the man in the ribs, feet scraping uselessly against the ground, until two more jumped on top of him and began ripping into his limbs.

“M..mar– Mark _h-help me_ …” The words were being choked out through the mess of blood and saliva, in between gargled cries of pain, and Mark couldn’t think of a single thing to do. His hands were shaking uncontrollably.

“I’m sorry- I’m sorry...I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what to do!” He began to babble incoherently. All of the infected were now focused on David, besides the ones still feasting on Sungho. Mark was invisible to them, and useless to help.

_“Minhyung!”_

His mother’s wailing pierced his ears, tearing his eyes away from the gory display in front of him to the bus behind. The shadows Mark had seen drifting between the cars had solidified into at least eight roamers, approaching the bus quickly as those on board screamed through the windows and those outside fought each other to get on. Mark could make out his father arguing with a couple of the other men, his mother shaking in the doorway, both being pushed back and restrained by the rest who were trying to force them up the steps.

_They’re leaving me._ Mark realized, gut sinking. _They’re going to leave me._

“Wait! **STOP**!” Next he knew, he was sprinting up the ramp, trauma behind him forgotten and the wind stinging his eyes blind as he desperately chased after his last chance of salvation. The bus doors slammed shut, his father being hauled back with an arm around his neck and more across his chest, glasses askew as he struggled. His mother was half hanging out a window, reaching desperately in Mark’s direction as she was pulled back in, her hair flying wildly in the breeze like an apparition.

The engine turned, rumbling to life. The wheels screeched against the pavement as the gas pedal was slammed, the bus ripping across the open road and leaving the gas station, and Mark, behind in the dust.

He chased after it as long as he could, but the adrenaline of the day and his empty stomach left his stamina shot and his head aching. His breath wheezed painfully in his chest, his legs burned and cramped, and it took the last few shreds of his will to keep from collapsing face first onto the asphalt. He crumpled, his arms thrown behind his nape, struggling to pull more oxygen into his lungs.

He was alone.

Abandoned on some random stretch of highway, God knows how far from Seattle or any kind of civilization. His family was gone.

He was suddenly aware that he was still clutching the handgun uselessly in his hand. The safety was still on.

_David_. He’d left him. He did nothing to save him, and then ran the second he could.

_Mark left him to die._

Then what was this, karmic justice? Since he had been so selfish, Mark had signed his own death warrant? He could almost laugh if it weren’t for the overwhelming feeling of pure despair.

The infected who had been ambling towards the bus were long gone, as was the off ramp. They must’ve fallen off in the desperate chase, or noticed the easy feeding frenzy happening below and gone to join.

There were no exits behind him, or in front. Only rusty signs with their mocking Seattle: 30 Miles staring him in the face.

So he walked, feet dragging on the white paint lines on the edge of the highway, bag digging into his shoulders and back bruised from the thumping of the useless bottles of Gatorade against his spine.

He walked until the sun was setting so low in the sky that the shadows of the trees stretched long and whimsical across the road, and the breeze grew cold enough to chill the salt across his face. His stomach had grown from an uncomfortable gnawing to a painful acidic roar, and the couple of bottles he had chugged and the chocolate he had eaten only made Mark nauseous and unsteady. He was beginning to shiver in his hoodie, the events of the day and the physical exertion leaving all his muscles feeling wrung out and achingly sore.

Mark needed to find something to eat, and somewhere to sleep.

Another small group of empty cars was pushed to the side of the road a bit ahead, and one more exit loomed beyond them off into the city of Everett. The cars were an option, but Mark doubted that there would be any food, and remaining out on the highway as roamer bait for the night (if he didn’t get hypothermia or something of the sort) was not an appealing choice.

Into Everett then? If he kept quiet and moved quick, odds are there would be some house he could break in to for the night. Ponder over what his next move was. The only option would be to walk the rest of the way to Seattle – Mark had never even driven a car, much less hot wire one. Plus, these cars have been abandoned for God knows how long, with the engines likely dead and tanks spent.

He swerved towards the cars anyway, if just to peek inside and see if there was anything visible he could grab, whether some clothes or another weapon. The gun had been shoved back into his belt loop again, bouncing against his hip with every step. It scared him.

Mark began to talk out loud to himself, if for nothing but keeping himself sane and focused with the delirium beginning to build in his brain.

“Cheeseburger. Ice Cream. Buffalo wings. That sounds good. Idiot. Fucked it up, now you’re going to walk all the way? Yeah right. We’re gonna get mauled in our sleep and that’s it, the end, lights out for Mark Lee. Thanks for playing!” He rambled, peering in through filthy car windows. He picked up a long stick from the ground, swinging it in his hand. Seeing a flash of brown across a front seat, he wound up like a batter on home base, and focusing all his rage, smashed clean through the glass.

The window shattered into countless shards which fell around him, covering the ground in glittering pieces. The brown blob turned out to be a part of a large leather jacket, tossed unceremoniously across the seat.

“Score.”

He shoved his arm in, careful to avoid the remaining chunks of glass clinging to the sill, and reached down to grab the jacket.

_“Eurgh…”_

There was a soft exhale, almost mistakable for a trick of the wind, if it weren’t for the sudden growl and screech that followed as an infected, nearly skeletal and demonic from decomposition, threw themselves at Mark’s arm from the back seat.

“FUCK-” Mark threw himself backwards, the jacket gripped tight in his fist, but the complete underside of his arm raked across a shard of glass in the process. Pain exploded immediately in his skin, along with beads of blood that began to well through the cut fabric of his sleeve.

He curled over, the jacket tossed to the side and injured limb clutched close to his chest as he squeezed his eyes shut against the pain. There was a further wave of breaking glass and growling – he opened his eyes to see the roamer beginning to clamber out of the window, black tongue curling out grotesquely from its skeletal jaws around rotten brown teeth. None of the others Mark had seen had been this hideous, this _inhuman_.

Before he could even think, he was swinging the stick down hard on top of its skull, beating it to a pulp against the car. He didn’t stop until the monster was completely still, brains and putrid decaying flesh dripping down the door. The smell hit Mark like a vile tidal wave, and he lurched to the side, emptying what little clung to his stomach into the partition’s grass. It took several minutes of dry-heaving, crouching over and spitting, for his guts to stop trying to expel themselves from his body. The stick, covered with scraps of dangling skin and already swarming with flies, was tossed unceremoniously back into the vehicle.

The burning pain from the cut in his arm had faded off a bit to a sharp ache. However, the bleeding had yet to stop, streaming sluggishly down his wrist and dripping off of his fingertips. Peeling back his sleeve revealed a jagged gash, varying in depth from a shallow scratch at the ends to cut deep and near to the bone in the middle. Mark cautiously prodded the skin around it, hissing as the wound stung anew.

Pulling his sleeve back down over the cut, Mark pushed down hard with his palm, sucking in air through his teeth as his head swam and his knees threatened to give out. He’d never been good dealing with blood before.

Once he could finally blink the black spots from his eyes and blood stopped seeping through his sleeve, Mark straightened back up. It took a minute to successfully tie his new jacket around his waist using only one hand, and he shifted his backpack to hang off his other shoulder to leave his injured arm free to swing. There was a voice in the back of his head reminding him of important concepts such as ‘disinfection, sterile bandage, stitches’, but given the total lack of supplies in his backpack, and the fact that he had absolutely no actual idea where he was, those thoughts had to be shoved back unceremoniously out of his conscious. 

“Alright, alright. Priorities, Mark, c’mon. Remember Cub Scouts, What’s most important?” He muttered to himself, looking up and rescanning his surroundings. The sun had set even deeper on the horizon. “Food. Water. Shelter. Those are going to be in town.”

The walk down the road exit to Everett took at least thirty minutes, as Mark stumbled forward dizzy on unsteady legs, anxiety jumping at every sound and shadow. He finally reached an intersection, with two roads to the right leading in to residential streets, and the one road on the left reaching a dead end at a dilapidated McDonald’s, every window broken and the iconic ‘M’ sign dangling loosely from one end. The streetlight hanging over the intersection was dead, each light somehow shattered as if someone had stood underneath and thrown rocks up at them.

Mark quickly turned down the first residential street, too exhausted to be cautious any longer. Every house seemed empty and dark, but the first few blocks had obviously been ransacked with nearly all of the doors busted down and windows destroyed.

Eventually, he reached a house that seemed fairly undisturbed. Breaking in through an unlocked side door in the garage, Mark began to desperately search the house for any food. Every shelf was empty, besides a box of forgotten crackers that had been torn into by rodents. There was somehow enough pressure left in the pipes to spurt out about a minute's worth of rusty water, which Mark gulped down straight from the tap. The house was completely empty, with only one bedroom and one bathroom to check. Mark used the last of his energy to push a bookcase against the door as a makeshift barricade, pulling all the curtains closed tight.

A search of the bathroom revealed a half-empty bottle of Hydrogen Peroxide. Peeling his sleeve off of the cut, where it had stuck and dried along with the blood, was torture in itself. Mark wasted a minute to recover, pulling the sweatshirt off over his head and tossing it to the ground. Gritting his teeth in preparation, he clenched his right hand into a fist and with his left, poured the rest of the bottle's contents onto the wound. The cut immediately began to burn viciously, Mark staggering and slamming the counter with his knee as he hissed and swore through his teeth. He left the bottle uncapped, wiping his face down with a hand towel. Glancing up at his reflection in the mirror, he could see that he had done nothing but spread the mess of dirt, sweat, and oil grease further across his face. His hair was a filthy matted mess, the black strands clumped together. His eyes were swollen and dark, a physical representation of his sheer exhaustion.

The bedroom was strewn with piles of clothes, as if the past owners of this house had left in a rush and grabbed only what was most essential. It didn't take too long for Mark to find a couple spare t-shirts, one of which he tore apart with his teeth and used as a makeshift bandage. He managed to get a few more bursts of water from the bathroom sink and tub, which he used to wipe his face fully free of grime and rinse out some of the sweat from his hair. He was still starving and vaguely thirsty, but he already felt better with a clean face and fresh clothes.

It was now fully dark outside, the street barely illuminated by the faint glow of the moon. Any remaining chance or energy to go and continue to search for food was long gone. Sleeping in the bedroom felt weird to Mark, who already felt like he was invading the personal space of strangers. So instead, he curled up on the couch in the living room, wrapping himself up in his leather jacket and pulling a throw blanket over his legs.

Sleep came to Mark fitfully. He tossed and turned throughout the night, shivering and in pain. At one point, he awoke and stared up at the ceiling. The weight of everything that had happened not only that day, but for the past year, suddenly crashed down on him.

Next thing he knew, he was choking back sobs, tears running hot down his cheeks. He covered his face with his hands, trying to inhale deeply through his hiccuping chest as the sadness threatened to overwhelm him completely.

Everyone was gone now. His poor parents...they probably thought that he was dead. Two sons gone in a couple of months. And Mark was about as good as dead. Lost, confused, starving.

Sungho and David...he'd left them! He left them both to die, left David to be torn apart alive, by running to try to save himself. So fucking selfish. And now Mark has blood on his hands, sin staining his spirit.

" _I'm sorry. I'm so sorry_..." He choked out into his palms. Mark pulled the two cross pendants out of the collar of his shirt, clutching them between his hands. As soon as the tears no longer threatened to overwhelm him, he began to whisper desperate prayers with his lips pressed against the metal. Prayers for Sungho's soul, David's soul, Jacob's soul, prayers for his parents and his friends. He didn't dare to ask for anything for himself.

Eventually he must've fallen asleep, waking to harsh sunlight cutting through the gaps in the blinds. His eyes felt sore and dry, his eyelashes glued together with the salt left behind by his tears. His stomach was still painfully empty, the back of his throat sour, but Mark's head felt clearer after the bit of sleep he managed to get. The watch on his wrist read _10:26_ by the time he was able to force himself to get up.

It's now been over 24 hours since the last time Mark had really eaten anything, and he knew that finding food had to be the number one priority before he could even consider walking on the highway again.

Everything was as quiet as it was yesterday. Mark began to wander farther into the city in search of undisturbed houses or maybe a convenience store, but every building seemed stripped bare. He had just turned down what felt like the thousandth street when a 7/11 suddenly appeared as if he had summoned it from his mind.

" _Oh thank God_..." Mark exclaimed, somehow finding a second wind and jogging down the rest of the road until he reached the front door. Throwing them open, his eyes immediately landed on a display of protein bars and beef jerky, perfectly arranged and barely touched. He immediately began to rip open and choke down Natural Valley bars, grimacing at the dry stickiness of the combination oof his dehydrated tongue and the stale powdery oats, but swallowing it all nonetheless. Once he had eaten a few, he turned his gaze to the beverage refrigerators, and the rows of water bottles conveniently forgotten in the lower shelves.

He had to resist pouring an entire bottle over his head, ultimately chugging half of one despite the slight chemical flavor and spilling the rest down the back of his shirt. All the remaining Gatorade in his backpack was unceremoniously dumped out onto the floor, and he quickly refilled it with as many bottles of water, granola bars, and beef jerky sticks that he could. He even managed to find a miniature first aid kit, which he added to his new stockpile.

"Score, dude..." Mark muttered to himself with glee, already feeling a thousand times better with actual food churning in his stomach. It was only about noon...what else did he have to lose than to head back towards the highway?

Thus, with his new supply of snacks and water and a fresh skip in his step, Mark began to trace his way back out of Everett. If he kept a good pace, he'd be able to make it to at least another exit and cross off a couple more miles.

He had made it a few blocks, humming to himself and sauntering down the middle of the street, when his joyful moment of peace and distraction was interrupted with that now instantly recognizable screech of a nearby infected. Mark immediately dove behind the nearest parked car, anxiously peering over the hood in the direction of the sound.

Two roamers, one man and one woman, soon staggered out of a nearby alleyway. The man, middle-aged and bald, was wearing a garishly bright yellow Hawaiian shirt that was severely ripped and covered with unidentifiable brown stains. The woman seemed a similar age, with long black braids that hung limply as she trembled forward on twisted legs. Her eyes were completely white, and her entire face was crossed by a large, thick wound that had rotted deep enough to expose bone. The man's lower jaw seemed to be dislocated, twisted way too far to the right to be natural.

They both took their time slowly crossing the street, tracing circles into the pavement and croaking up at the sky. Their hands were clutched tight in a claw shaped position, and if Mark weren't scared out of his mind, he might've joked that they walked like a pair of chickens.

Any humor he might have been able to find, however, soon vanished as the woman suddenly paused and began to sniff in his direction. Mark must absolutely stink of sweat, grime, and fear, and she was honing in. Before long the man also turned to face Mark's way, and both began to cautiously pick their way towards his hiding space.

He was quickly running out of options. Fighting two roamers in close spaces seemed like a bad idea, personally. He had no weapon, and the gun still seemed too foreign and threatening to be an option. He could climb under the car, but there's nothing to stop them from still sniffing him out.

Running was the last option. Lucky winner!

He needed to catch them in a moment of surprise. Neither of them looked particularly athletic, but neither was Mark. Plus, he had only just eaten for the first time in a day. His tank was probably still running on empty.

There was a large lug bolt down by his right foot. He picked it up gingerly in his left hand, and launched it as far as he could in the opposite direction. The bolt landed somewhere in the distance, loudly clanging against the pavement, and both infected whipped around to follow the noise. Mark waited until they had begun to step away, steeling his nerves.

_Wait for it._

__

_Wait._

__

_5._

__

_4._

__

_3._

__

_2._

__

_1._

__

_GO!_

Mark ran. His feet loudly slapped the ground, his panting echoed in his ears, and immediately he could hear a rising chorus of screeching behind him, followed by screams and grunts as they presumably leapt in pursuit, enraged by the trickery.

He ran and ran and ran, until his legs burned with exhaustion and his chest became so strained that he could barely suck in any shallow breaths. The infected behind him were as slow as he had predicted, but showed no sign of giving up their hunt.

He'd have to break away eventually, dive into a house or garage to hide-

The sound of gunshots ripped through the air, Mark covering his head in reflex as the two infected fell behind him. Mark took a misstep in his panic, and pain exploded through his left ankle as it rolled underneath him. He staggered, barely able to catch himself as he bent over and wheezed.

**_"Who are you?"_ **

A voice yelled at him, threatening and blunt. Mark lifted his head to make out a tall and blurry figure a couple yards ahead, holding a gun aloft that was pointing in Mark's direction.

"Hi, uh– thanks, I, sorry I can't–" He stuttered, still trying to catch his breath but raising his hands up in a desperate _please-don't-shoot-me_ gesture.

"Who. Are. You?" The figure asked again, somehow even more forcefully. He took a step closer.

"Mark! My name is Mark!"

"Is that a bite?"

"What?"

"I'm not going to ask again. _Is. That. A. Bite?_ " The stranger gestured with the gun up at Mark's right arm. Mark glanced at it – blood had begun to soak through his makeshift t-shirt bandage from the night before.

"No! No, it's just a cut. I'm not bitten!"

The stranger took a couple of steps forward, his aim not wavering once.

"Are you armed?"

"I, uh, I have a gun! But I can't use it, it's in my bag. I swear!"

"Drop the bag!"

Mark immediately let the shoulder straps slip down his arms, dropping his backpack behind him. He instantly threw his hands back up.

"Who are you with?"

"I'm not with anyone."

The stranger audibly scoffed. "Bullshit."

"I'm not bullshitting you, dude! I have nothing else on me! I'm just trying to get to Seattle, _please_."

The figure seemed to cock his head contemplatively, lowering the gun.

"Seattle, huh?"

"Yes, Seattle."

"You said your name is Mark?"

Mark felt a premature wave of relief trickle down his spine. He was going to let Mark go.

"Yeah, I'm Mark."

The stranger yanked his hood off of his head. Mark could just make out messy black hair and a red bandana pulled up high over his face. He seemed to take a moment to look Mark up and down with a judgemental look, gaze passive and unimpressed. Mark shifted his weight anxiously.

"Well, nice to meet you, 'Mark'. Good night!" He raised a hand casually and waved in Mark's direction, wiggling his fingers almost teasingly.

_Good night? What–_

There was a burst of sprinting feet behind him. Before Mark could open his mouth to ask what the _hell_ the stranger was talking about, something hard slammed into the back of his head, and everything went dark as he crumpled to his knees.

* * *

_'Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,_

_And grace my fears relieved._

_How precious did that grace appear,_

_The hour I first believed._

* * *

The first thing Mark became aware of upon regaining consciousness was the pounding pain inside his skull. It felt like somehow had used his head for batting practice, and as far as he knew, that might as well have been what had happened. His headache was so bad that he felt nauseous.

It took an extreme amount of effort to open his eyes, as the tension in his jaw left him barely able to squint. He realized that he was lying on a bed, with a pillow shoved under his head and his jacket laid across him like a blanket. He forced his eyes open all the way, gingerly lifting his head to survey his surroundings. His ankle appeared to be wrapped in a combination of cardboard, ace bandage, and _bubble wrap?_ His injured arm was held against his chest by a makeshift sling, and its bandage seemed to have been freshly changed.

"Good morning, sleeping beauty!"

Mark shot up right, scrambling backwards against the bed with a burst of fear and adrenaline even as his head swam uncomfortably with the sudden motion.

"Whoa, whoa, _slow down_."

There was a tall, lean, and handsome young man sitting by the window of the room, tilting back in his chair and balancing it on two legs with ease. He was cleaning a long machete that he held in his lap, whistling with each long wipe down the blade with a red bandana. The recognition sparked in Mark's brain a few seconds too late.

"You... _you shot me_!"

The man paused and looked up at him incredulously. He raised one eyebrow mockingly. "Shot you?" He laughed, tossing his head back as if he just couldn't believe what he was hearing. "Let me ask you right now – Do you feel like you've been shot?"

"I..." Mark stammered, swallowing in embarrassment. He clutched his injured arm closer to his chest. "No."

"Yeah, no. You took a solid hit on the head though, that's for sure. Sorry about that. My friend can be a bit too enthusiastic sometimes.

"Your friend?"

"He's not here right now. It's not important. On the other hand, though..." The stranger adjusted in his seat to face in Mark's direction, lifting the tip of the blade up to point at him threateningly. "I do have some important questions for you."

"For me?" Mark shuffled, pushing his back up against the headboard for stability. "I've told you who I am. I should be asking the questions. _Where am I? Who are you?_ "

"You're in a Motel 6 in Everett, Washington. Room 208 to be exact. My name is Johnny. Johnny Suh." He put down the machete, and stood from his chair. Six feet of cool intimidation.

"I know your name, Mark. I know that you say you're going to Seattle. But I'm sure there's a lot more information you could be inclined to share with me. So!" Johnny sauntered over to the side of the bed, taking his time with each step as Mark's heart pounded harder and harder in his chest. He leaned over him, blocking out the sunlight behind him with a darkening smirk.

"Let's talk, why don't we?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for checking this out! If you liked, please consider dropping a kudos or a comment down below, I'd love to hear any thoughts!
> 
> You can also find me on twitter @ lueurvacillante :) ❤️


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mark properly meets Johnny and Yuta for the first time. Awkward conversations occur. A sad truth is revealed, and Mark's new future is sealed with a handshake.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello everyone! welcome back to chapter 2!
> 
> for those of you who have been waiting since october, i'm so sorry it took so long to get this out! i've been writing in between tsunamis of course work and last week i finally stopped and realized my original plan for this chapter had it topping out at over 20k words. so, to spare everyone that onslaught, i've cut it into two parts so that hopefully the second part won't take too long to finish. as a result, this chapter is a bit slow and more dialogue based – a little bit of a break! as always, please read the tags before reading!
> 
> chapter tw: references to minor character death, smoking, drinking, references to drug use, brief underage drinking

When Mark was 10 years old, one of his friends was kidnapped. 

His family was still living in New York at the time, his dad an assistant pastor at one of the many Korean immigrant churches in the city, his mom a secretary at an insurance firm. They lived comfortably in a small but cozy apartment in Queens, Mark happily kept busy by band practice and basketball club at one of the local city public schools. 

His friend’s name was Ryan. He and Mark had neighboring backpack cubbies and matching Spiderman sneakers, and they often traded pokemon cards during lunch period. One ordinary Tuesday, Ryan, Mark, and the rest of the fifth grade boys were in the middle of a recess kickball game when one of the front office staff walked up, telling Ryan that his father was there to pick him up for a dentist appointment. They all whined, high-fived goodbye, and went about their business. It wasn’t until later that afternoon that any of them knew something was wrong. 

Mark had sprinted home from the bus stop, giddy to show his mom the _A+_ written in purple glitter pen on top of his latest book report. She was waiting for him, but instead of a welcoming smile she only grimaced at Mark’s beaming grin. Held loosely in her hand was her phone, blaring with the _Amber Alert_ notification. 

Ryan’s father _was_ the one to pick him up, but was estranged from his mom and had a court order against unsupervised visits. Luckily the police had managed to find Ryan by that evening, but Mark could never forget the fear for his friend, and the terror that something similar could happen to him. He had nightmares for weeks – strangers climbing through his windows and nabbing him as he slept, abducting him from school and throwing him into mysterious white vans as he screamed for help to no avail. 

After one particularly scary dream, he awoke and ran into his parents bedroom, bawling his eyes out. They held him tight, wiped his tears, assured him of his safety, and taught him the three most important things to remember if he ever were to be in a dangerous situation.

Never approach or accept anything from strangers.

Never talk to or follow a stranger without either Mom or Dad present.

If anyone makes you feel unsafe, turn and run.

He’d already broken those three rules, Mark realized, as he sat silent on the squeaky motel boxspring. He’d approached a stranger - check. He’d talked to a stranger - check. Now, he was accepting an apple and a bag of fritos from a stranger - check. 

_At least running isn’t even an option._ Mark thought to himself sarcastically, staring at the makeshift splint around his ankle, which was now boosted up on a faded floral-print pillow. _Mom would’ve been so disappointed._

The stranger in question – Johnny, as he’d introduced himself – had stepped back from the side of bed, once again reclining leisurely in the chair by the window. In a weird switch up from the intimidating posturing from only five minutes prior, he had pulled a plastic grocery bag out from under the desk to his right. 

“But, before that, let’s eat.”

He fumbled with the contents for a moment, before taking out the pack of fritos and the apple and tossing them at Mark with little regard for his bandaged arm. Mark had juggled them to his side, picking up the apple and holding it close to his eyes quizzically before glancing beyond it at Johnny in confusion. Mark could’ve sworn the now tossed-aside machete was about to be pressed against his throat. Instead, he was being _fed_.

“I found those hanging off some random tree yesterday. Can’t get more organic than that, huh?”

“...You’re not going to poison me, are you?”

Johnny glanced up at him from under a furrowed brow, looking fairly unimpressed by the suggestion. Mark took the hint and bit into the apple graciously, humming his thanks as juice accidentally spilled down his chin. Johnny didn’t break eye contact, and Mark swallowed his bite too quickly out of nervous reflex. A chunk of apple brushed the wrong side of his esophagus, and he lurched sideways, coughing violently into the crook of his elbow until he was able to spit the offending piece of fruit into his palm.

“Hmm. Nice.” 

Johnny’s voice was low and smooth despite the lilt of disgust. The way he spoke seemed to be extremely coherent, the sound inflected easily by whatever meaning he wished to impress upon his words. Compared to Mark, who had a bad habit of stumbling over what he wanted to say and ending up just muttering phrases like “Umm…” or just “Oh my _god!_ ”, it made Johnny even more intimidating. In the last 12 or so hours that Mark had heard him speak, he’d been reassured by that voice, scared by that voice, and now he felt judged, as if he were nothing but a kicked puppy. 

“I haven’t really eaten in awhile.” Mark muttered, wiping his chin with the back of his wrist and taking another bite of the unripe fruit, chewing more slowly. 

“You certainly look like it.” Johnny commented. He’d tied the red bandana he had worn prior around his wrist like a bracelet. “It took Yuta awhile to patch you up.”

“Yuta?”

“My friend. The one who hit you over the head. He is sorry about that, by the way.”

“Well, he’ll have to apologize to my face first.” He grumbled. His headache was still rolling in full swing, leaving Mark shuddering with each new pounding of his skull. 

“Eh. I’m sure he will.” 

Mark finished the apple, sucking the last of the sweet flavor from the core before gently placing it on the bedside table. He looked back up at Johnny, using this opportunity to really case him out. Johnny was obviously tall, wearing a large black hoodie with his evidently long legs shrouded in thick khaki green cargo pants which were cuffed above a pair of heavily scuffed black work boots. He kept adjusting his position in his seat as if he couldn’t get comfortable in the space, unfolding and refolding his legs repeatedly with every shuffle. Despite that, he still commanded an air of respect – or at the very least, _look-at-me_ and _listen-to-me_ energy. 

His hair was pitch black and hung low around his ears, clearly overgrown. The thick strands framed a handsome and angular face, with narrowly shrewd eyes that carefully tracked Mark's every move. His face was surprisingly pale, as if he spent most of his time inside instead of roaming the streets and knocking unsuspecting strangers over the head. However, his hands were far more tanned – presumably a result of Johnny’s bandana-hood style Mark had seen earlier keeping the sun off of his face.

Johnny had not broken eye contact this entire time – but his gaze was no longer one of danger. It was a bit distrustful, sure, but surprisingly open. Something had changed in the way he viewed Mark. 

Maybe it was his messy, pitiful appearance. Maybe it was his already numerous wounds and evidently failed attempt to survive on his own. 

Mark was definitely not an immediate threat. He was still a risk.

“Why did you help me?” Mark asked quietly. 

Johnny tilted his head to the side. “A zombie’s a zombie. Who’s to say I helped you and didn’t just shoot to save myself?”

“You could’ve actually shot me. Left me there.”

“That wouldn’t be fair. Yuta hit you on the head. You’d be defenseless.” 

“So instead you dragged me here. Bandaged my injuries. Now you’re feeding me.”

Johnny reached down back into the bag, pulling out another apple. He produced a switchblade from his pocket, and began to carve off the peel in long, spiral strips that fell in a lopsided pile on the carpet.

“Would you rather starve?”

“You’re not answering my question.”

“Ask it again, then.” 

“Why did you help me? You don’t know me.” Mark lifted his wounded arm. “This could’ve been a bite. I could’ve lied to you.”

The corner of Johnny’s mouth quirked as if he was holding back a patronizing smile. “But you didn’t lie to me, did you?”

“....No.” 

“Then why would we have killed you? You were alone, obviously lost, and running for your life. I don’t normally shoot living people.”

Mark didn’t respond, too busy digging deep in the packet of fritos and chasing remaining crumbs with his fingertips, while also pondering the sanity of Johnny’s judgement. Once he was done licking the last of the salt off of the foil like a hungry dog, Johnny tossed a water bottle onto the bed spread, alongside a couple of obscure white pills. Mark chugged the water within seconds, taking a bit longer to scrutinize the medication.

“It’s Tylenol. I’m not going to poison you, man. It took long enough getting you up here – you can walk out on your own next time.” 

Mark swallowed the pills, resigned. It occurred to him, rather belatedly, that he hadn’t seen his bag since he had woken up.

“Where’s my backpack?” 

Johnny snapped his fingers in recognition, standing once again and walking over to the closet with casual steps. He opened the door, pulling Mark’s familiar grey Jansport down from off of a hanger. “Here it is. With everything intact. Minus a jerky stick or two.” He placed the bag down gently by Mark’s feet. The zipper was undone.

“You went through it?”

“Of course we did. Had to make sure you were being honest about that gun. Why weren’t you using it, by the way?”

Mark’s chest seized, trapping his air in a flash of anxiety at the reminder of the weapon. “I...I don’t like it. I don’t want to use it.”

There was a pause of disapproving silence. 

“Oh yeah. That’ll last.” 

Johnny went back once again to his seat, this time propping his feet up on the end of the bed casually. “Feeling better now?”

The water and quick snack had done wonders for the remaining dizziness swimming through Mark’s consciousness. The dull throbbing behind his temples was still present, but it was far more manageable. Mark once again became aware of the sharp pain in his elevated ankle, the burn of the cut in his arm, but each injury felt somewhat distant, as if he could honestly ignore them. He nodded, gently bobbing his head.

“Yes.”

“Good.” Something in Johnny’s posture changed. He was still relaxed, but more alert. He paused before continuing, leaning forward. “Where are you from, Mark?”

Here was the interrogation that Mark had been waiting for. Johnny seemed reasonable. If he was going to harm Mark, surely he would have done so already, before wasting resources patching him back up. Staying honest seemed the way to go – it wasn’t like there was any legitimate reason to lie, anyway.

“I’m from Vancouver.”

“Vancouver?” Johnny sounded surprised, and increasingly curious. “What are you doing south of the border?”

“Vancouver was collapsing.”

“What do you mean? Outbreaks?”

“The military started it...they were essentially dictators. I was going to be enlisted this summer, and instead, my parents chose to run. As we were leaving the city, it was overrun by roamers. We barely made it out.”

“Roamers?”

“Yeah. The infected.”

“Interesting name choice. Huh. Well, that’s kind of depressing.”

“What is?”

“That Canada didn’t have it’s shit together. I don’t know – I guess I thought that you guys would have been handling all this a lot better than we have.”

“Well...” Mark gestured at himself and all of his wounds. “Obviously not.”

Johnny was fiddling with his bandana again, having untied it from his wrist and now wrapping it repeatedly around his palm. He stared down at the repetitive motion, like it was a tick to help focus while he was thinking. “Alright then. So your city was falling and you had to run. Why come down to Seattle?”

“My dad heard a rumor that there was a survivor community set up, inviting any refugees to come join. It was our only option. We had kids, elderly, people who couldn’t handle a longer trip.”

Johnny didn’t respond for a bit, brow furrowed as if he was searching through his memory. “A survivor’s community in Seattle?”

“...Yeah. Apparently there were radio broadcasts.” Mark swallowed around the sudden lump of fear in his throat. “You haven’t heard about it?”

Johnny fell unnervingly silent for a minute. “Well, we haven’t been in the area for long. But I’d assume a quarantine zone was established at the beginning of all this.” Yeah, Johnny definitely seemed to recognize Mark’s spike in anxiety. “It’s pretty likely.”

His response did little to help, though Mark found himself leaning hard on his own optimism. “It’s gotta exist. Why else would people talk about it?”

“I mean, fair enough. You said you were travelling with your family though. Were they also in Everett? We’re not about to be hunted down, are we?”

“No, no they’re not. We were traveling with a group of people from our church. We stopped at a gas station to try and find some water and…” A pause, a shaky swallow. “...some shit happened. I got left behind by mistake.”

“So instead you randomly decided to wander down into Everett?”

“Well, it wasn’t my initial plan.” Mark retorted quickly, suddenly feeling a bit indignant. “I cut my arm on a car window fighting with a roamer, I hadn’t eaten all day, and it was getting dark. Crashing for the night somewhere that was hopefully at least a little safe seemed the right thing to do.”

“Ah. So when we ran into you, you were heading back to the highway?”

“Yeah. I was going to walk.”

Johnny raised an eyebrow. “You were going to walk to Seattle. All alone, with minimal supplies, and an arm cut like that.”

“The cut wasn’t that bad. It was you pointing your fucking gun at me making me trip and your friend hitting me over the head that’s really causing the most pain at the moment.”

“Well, better than being dead at the jaws of those two chasing you.” Johnny snapped back, although his mouth was quirked in a jovial smirk.

Mark opened his mouth to repond, before ultimately shutting it and huffing his defeat through his nose. 

“Obviously.” 

Johnny’s light smile widened further in amusement. 

Outside the room, there was the sudden sound of heavy and dragging footsteps breaking through the silent air – the burst of noise made Mark jump a bit in his seat. Whoever was responsible for the steps took their time climbing up the motel’s stairs, the rusting metal creaking under the weight of every shuffling stride. The doorknob to the room began to scrap back and forth as whoever was on the other side began to fiddle with it heavily, muttering to themselves as the lock refused to give. 

Mark immediately tensed, his heartrate spiking in fear as he stared at the door. Suddenly feeling extremely vulnerable, he reached out and grabbed one of the pillows next to him, clutching it tightly against his chest in case he needed it as a possible projectile.

Johnny, in contrast, didn’t react at all. 

In the midst of Mark’s bewilderment about how the _hell_ Johnny was being so casual about the imminent danger _right outside_ , whoever it was seemingly got tired of trying to enter the room like a normal person and begin to slam violently against the door with their shoulder. 

The door finally swung open after a couple of solid bangs, and in walked the second stranger of the day. His face was completely obscured by a solid black neck armer that pulled all the way up over his nose and a pair of cheap aviator sunglasses. They were tacky and neon orange, the kind of style that Mark randomly remembered were all the rage back in seventh grade. Mark could just make out shaggy bits of bleached orange-blond hair poking out from inside the man’s sweatshirt hood. 

Whoever it was, they completely ignored Mark besides a cursory glance. Instead, they approached Johnny, who greeted them with a familiar smile and a light high five. After pulling down his neck warmer and removing his sunglasses, the stranger dropped his own backpack on the table next to Johnny’s belongings, and began to dig through its contents. His back was still towards Mark.

_“That fucking door is such a pain in the ass.”_

_“I can use the doorknob just fine. You’re the one who’s always launching yourself at it.”_

_“Hah. Whatever. There’s a small grocery store about a mile and a half away – it was still completely locked up. Most of the inventory gone to shit, of course, but I found a few things.”_

He spoke, not in American English, as Mark had expected, but in _Korean_. It took Mark a moment of shock and surprise to recognize his parents’ mother tongue and actually begin mentally translating to the best of his ability. 

_“You found spam? And instant rice?”_ Johnny perked up more and more at every new product placed on the table, excitedly grabbing a can of Bush’s Baked Beans and clutching it against his chest. 

_"Found enough for at least a couple days, if not a week. Some good karma finally fucking swung our way."_ The stranger reached his arms above his head in a long, groaning stretch, cracking his neck and his knuckles before spinning around to look at Mark.

His face, like Johnny's, was also Asian and unfairly handsome, with a full mane of shaggy bleached hair, a strong jawline, and a very similar judging look in his eyes. However, unlike Johnny who had been staring at Mark's face, this guy was looking instead at his ankle splint, then at his bandaged arm, before finally glancing up at Mark's head. He crossed his arms and tilted his own head to the side quizzically, before turning back to Johnny and addressing him first.

_"How is he feeling? Does he need painkillers? I found some more acetaminophen and fresh bandages at the grocery store too."_

Johnny shrugged. _"He complained that his head hurt, for obvious reasons, but nothing else. I've been asking him about some stuff. He says he's going to Seattle."_

The man barked out a harsh laugh. _"Seattle? Seriously? He wouldn't be able to get down the stairs, let alone crawl his ass to Seattle.”_ He gave Mark another look-over, his gaze so blunt and intense that Mark felt a shiver run down his spine. _“Do you think he's clear or do we have to move tonight?"_

_"I think he's good, man. Look at him, it's obvious he's not a threat. Even said he was with a church group."_

_"You still know that can be bullshit, Johnny, just like last time. Did you already forget three months ago when I had to rescue you from that cult outside San Jose? You idiot–"_

They continued to talk quietly, bickering amongst themselves. Mark just looked back and forth between the two of them, feeling like a bobblehead doll. 

"Wait– you guys are _Korean_?"

They both immediately jerked around to look back at Mark, seeming as equally surprised as he was.

"What?" Johnny asked, a bit confused. The stranger just squinted in Mark's direction.

"No, no –" Mark switched to Korean, stumbling over the difficult syllables on his clumsy tongue as he tried to string together some sentences in his head. _"I'm Korean too. I mean, I'm Canadian, but my parents are Korean."_

There was a momentary pause, the two of them sharing a look, before the stranger smirked, seemingly finding this situation a little funny.

_"Well, that makes everything a little easier."_

Johnny whistled, leaning back in his seat once again. _"What a fun and unexpected coincidence. Guess I don't have to play translator anymore._ It’s exhausting. _"_

_“Hey, don’t act like I’m stupid. It’s only the big words.”_

The other stepped closer to the bed, his posture and expression so strong and intimidating that Mark found himself shrinking back against the headboard.

 _"Does anything hurt?"_ He asked bluntly, placing his palms on both of Mark's cheeks and tilting his head to the side to examine the back of it. Mark suddenly became aware of a thick wad of gauze taped across the back of his skull.

 _"Yeah, my head hurts. Are you the one who decided to hit me in the first place?"_ Mark couldn't keep himself from snapping, his exhaustion suddenly feeling overwhelming as his headache grew in intensity, strong enough to make the room seem to spin.

But despite his tone, the guy didn't bite back, only humming in affirmation. _"Yeah, that's me. My name's Yuta."_

"You didn't need to whack me, dude. _I wasn't going anywhere_."

_"Better safe than sorry. You should learn to look behind you."_

Mark only scoffed in response. After a few more seconds of careful prodding, Yuta seemed satisfied. He stepped away for a moment back towards his backpack, digging through it to pull out the aforementioned bottle of acetaminophen. Johnny obediently passed him another bottle of water from the plastic bag on the floor when Yuta held out his hand expectedly.

 _"Here. Take these. Get some more sleep."_ Yuta quickly turned to drop the pills in Mark's palm and the bottle on his lap.

 _“He already gave me some pills a little while ago.”_ Mark nodded at Johnny, curling his fingers around the water bottle.

“ _So? Take some more._ It won’t kill you.”

Mark still felt a bit annoyed, but he swallowed the pills gladly, desperate for anything more that could finally take the rest of the edge off from his wounds. He still felt extremely uncomfortable in the room with the two of them, but some sense of relief was beginning to build in his chest.

Yuta motioned for Johnny to get up and follow him, and the two of them stepped out onto the balcony – presumably to speak privately, now that they knew Mark could understand their conversations.

Despite his reservations, and his own questions that he was desperate to ask (given that he had been interrogated, Mark was certain he deserved his own chance), the tiredness in his bones grew more and more overwhelming, and he soon found himself slipping down against the pillows with his eyelids sliding shut.

With the balcony door sliding closed and two pairs of eyes carefully watching in his direction, Mark found himself once again falling unconscious – thankfully this time without a hit to the head.

He was woken up a couple of hours later by someone gently shaking his shoulder. The sun was barely hanging on to the edge of the horizon, and in replacement of the rapidly vanishing daylight, a couple of candles and a single battery powered lantern were scattered throughout the room, mostly gathered upon the table. Johnny leaned over him, his features obscured and his form heavily shadowed in the dim glow.

"Hey. Want some more food?"

Dinner that night was the canned beans and slices of spam from earlier – Yuta had expertly fried the slices over a small fire he built in the motel room’s trash can. They all ate silently, the only words Mark saying at first being a soft “Thank you.” when his plate was handed to him. He had felt them staring at him curiously while he prayed over his meal, but neither made a single comment and turned to focus on their own plates.

Mark tried to pace himself, even as his mouth watered wildly at the first taste of actual food that he had savored in the last two days. 

Once he had finished swallowing down the last scraps on his plate, Mark gently set his plate down on his lap. Yuta and Johnny had pulled out two chairs to sit at the foot of the bed on either side of the table, both of them taking their own time to finish eating in silence.

Mark cleared his throat awkwardly, thinking of something casual to say. 

"So... why are you both here near Seattle? I mean... since you said earlier that you hadn't been here long."

They both shared a glance, Yuta looking back down at his plate in a clear sign for Johnny to answer.

"We're from the quarantine zone down in San Francisco. We traveled up to do some work along the coast with some trade routes."

“Work?”

“Deliveries, pick ups, drop offs.”

"Drop-offs?" Mark scrapped his fork through the grease on his plastic plate. "What kind of stuff were you dropping off?"

Johnny just looked at him blankly for a moment, as if waiting for something to click. Yuta smirked to himself behind his messy hair.

After taking a moment to read the room, Mark got the hint. 

"Oh. That kind of stuff." Mark had seen what kind of demons began to chase people during an apocalypse – and it wasn’t just the undead. It wasn’t uncommon in certain parts of Vancouver to pass an alleyway and see people huddled deep within the darkness, or to step on various hypodermic needles and bottle shards lying in the street. A pit dug into his stomach upon the realization that these two were drug smugglers. “Who do you trade with?”

“Who knows. We’re given what we need to carry and told which cities and addresses to leave it at. A fairly contact-less business. Most of it is probably going to small traveling groups, or to some other communities somewhere. It’s rare that anyone ever comes this far North.”

Mark’s mouth felt dry. He swallowed roughly, adjusting his necklace where the two pendants were digging into his throat. They flashed, silver, and gold, in the soft candle light. “Why do you do it? If...if you don’t mind me asking.”

Johnny’s expression remained as level as ever. “To survive. Vancouver sounded rough. I bet you San Francisco is probably a thousand times worse.”

Yuta huffed out a single laugh. _“Understatement.”_

"Yeah. Anyway, we finished about a day before we ran into you. Yuta's planning to start heading back down to that shithole within the week."

"Why only him?"

Johnny put his empty plate down on the tabletop. "I have some other drop offs I’m going to do solo. Then I’ve got business to deal with further east. Some personal stuff out in Chicago."

There was an old lukewarm six-pack of beer also sitting on the table. Yuta pulled a can off of the plastic ring and wasted no time in chugging a couple of gulps.

"How do you know each other? Since you're American and he's Korean...did you meet in the QZ?" 

Yuta snapped his fingers, his face screwed up as if he wasn’t sure he was hearing right. Johnny leaned over and quickly muttered a confirming translation. After hearing it, Yuta laughed out loud, putting his can back down with a solid clunk.

"I'm not Korean. I'm Japanese. _Have you ever met a Korean named Yuta?_ " He turned to ask Mark, his tone fluent and humorous even though his words were blunt.

Mark felt the tips of his ears burn in embarrassment. "Oh, right... _Sorry, your accent is so good, I just thought..._ "

 _"Hah. It better be good, I only spent like 4 years there being forced to speak it and being ridiculed whenever I misspoke._ " Yuta's smile seemed more like a grimace, and he quickly returned to drinking his beer.

Johnny sighed, low and soft. "Yuta and I met in Seoul. We were both working there. I came back to the States to visit family, he was in San Francisco for vacation, and then everything happened. A year later, here we are. Everyone's got to do what they have to." He reached over, pulling his own can out of the six-pack. He turned and held out another in an offer to Mark.

"You want one?" He asked, before suddenly yanking his arm back towards himself and squinting his eyes. "Wait, how old are you?"

"I'm 17. I'll be 18 in a few months."

"Hmm. That's what they always say."

"What the hell, Johnny, _just give it to him._ " Yuta muttered under his breath, having crushed his now empty can flat under his foot, fidgeting with the small flat ring of aluminum.

"Alright. He can have one. Probably not the best to mix too many with the amount of painkillers you've been giving him."

Mark leaned over to take the can from Johnny, popping it open and taking a cautious sip. Ugh. Beer had always tasted a bit off to him, and a year old room temperature variety was no better than the shit that Jaeseok used to steal from convenience stores.

"Church boy has drank before? For some reason I thought you'd be more hung up about it."

"You don't know me. It's been like, what, 8 hours since we first ran into each other?"

"Wrong. A day and a half."

Mark froze. "What?"

Johnny nodded. "A day and a half. You've been out since yesterday morning. Freaked the shit out of Yuta – he was worried he may have given you a brain bleed rather than a minor concussion. Lucky you woke up in the end, huh?"

"...Yeah. Great."

Johnny grinned at him toothily. "Just perfect."

"So then, you guys are like, what 20? 21?"

"You're close. 22."

"So what were you doing in South Korea? Wouldn't you be in college here somewhere?"

Johnny's posture and expression shifted just enough to show that this question was an unwelcome one. Mark suddenly felt a little guilty – he was clearly pushing a button by prying, but he'd already sat through his own interrogation and given Johnny a clear rundown of his recent past. It's only fair.

"Yuta and I were busy pursuing other career opportunities. Unfortunately, sometimes shit doesn't go your way and we both left."

“So you were interns or something?”

“Not exactly. More or less unpaid prisoners locked in tiny dormitories and forced to dance and sing like circus monkeys for old, creepy assholes to judge.”

"What, were you guys like idols?" Mark had vague memories of his mom blasting artists like H.O.T and Shinhwa in the car when he was little – others of girls in his middle school prayer group trading cardboard photos from various kpop boy bands during pizza time.

 _"Didn't get that far."_ Yuta muttered under his breath, now sitting back heavily in his chair. His eyes had grown significantly darker as the conversation continued. His second can was held tightly in his right hand.

"Yeah, we didn't end up making the final cut. A pretty intense industry, that's for sure." 

The mood had tanked considerably, having only been barely manageable to begin with.

"Well...not that it really matters anymore, right? With the whole...zombie apocalypse and everything..." Mark tried to joke, his tone feeling clumsy and awkward.

Johnny's sarcastic grin relaxed to a faint, nostalgic and sad smile. "Nah. I guess not."

Yuta remained quiet, his gaze softly drifting in between the two of them.

There was a sudden loud crash that sounded as if it came from the room below them – as if someone pushed over a heavy piece of furniture. A low but loud groan followed the noise, gradually increasing with volume. 

Yuta cursed, pounding his foot on the floor. “ _Yah, shut the fuck up!_ ”

The groan fell off into a grumble, before whatever was making the sound fell silent. Mark stared down at the floor, still slightly panicked from the initial noise. 

“What the hell was that?”

“Some random zombie. We locked him in when we first cleared this place. A waste of ammunition to shoot him – he was rotting already.” Mark’s dinner rolled uncomfortably in his stomach. Johnny continued, far too casual about everything. 

"Anyway. Yuta says you're still going to be pretty banged up for at least a couple more weeks. Your ankle was dislocated and sprained, and could take even longer to heal. He's still got to leave in a few days, but you can stay with me until you're good enough to walk on your own. I can go scout Seattle and get you there once you’re able to function normally. Hopefully you can meet up again with your parents."

Mark's mouth fell open, and he was stunned silent. How had he been so lucky to run into these two?

"I...uh...thanks.”

“It’s no problem.”

“Just...why are you both helping me?"

Johnny paused, finishing off the rest of his beer in one long swallow before answering.

"Because you should always try to help someone, Mark. Especially in times like these."

Yuta left early three days later.

They had remained cooped up at the motel nearly the entire time, Johnny fashioning Mark a makeshift crutch using some broom handles and duct tape so that he could roam the balcony and hallway whenever he started to get stir crazy, while Yuta continued to run supply runs to make sure that he, Johnny, and Mark were well stocked for each of their own individual journeys. The plan had been set – Johnny would head to Seattle the same day Yuta left, the decision being that the sooner the city was scouted, the sooner Mark could make the rest of his way there. Yuta would leave on foot to a garage they had set up another town over. There he’d find a Jeep and several gas canisters – enough to get him to Redding at the least.

Nights were spent huddled around the trash can fire for hours of awkward silence and stilted conversation, before they’d scatter throughout the room to sleep. Mark would lie awake, despite the fact that he got the bed by virtue of his injuries and Johnny and Yuta were spread out in sleeping bags on the scratchy, flat carpet. His mind would race endlessly until he’d finally faint from exhaustion sometime around early morning, being woken up only a few hours later for a small breakfast and more painkillers.

Once sunrise broke over the horizon on Yuta’s departure date, it was time for him to go. Yuta and Johnny spent many minutes standing together closely at the edge of the motel’s driveway, talking quietly amongst themselves in their own little bubble. They spared no more than a couple glances towards Mark, who was sitting on the front stoop of the main entrance nervously twiddling his thumbs and feeling as if he was interfering in some kind of private moment. Already his cuts and bumps had begun to subside, and the makeshift sling for his arm had been tossed out in favor of just gauze and an ace bandage. Hobbling down the stairs had been a trial, but Mark had been determined to officially see off one of the two men responsible for saving his life. 

Off in the distance, the trapped roamer banged against his door and moaned. 

Eventually, the two of them both seemed to run out of things to say. Yuta looked up at Johnny, brow furrowed as if he was trying to fight back a tear, before leaping onto the taller man and enveloping him in a bone-crushing hug. Johnny clung back just as hard, muttering something into Yuta’s ear with clenched teeth as the shorter one repeatedly clapped him on the back. The hug broke, they each took a step back, and with a nod to Johnny and a nod back in Mark’s direction, Yuta hoisted his backpack and his rifle holster higher up on his shoulders and began to stroll down the street, kicking absentmindedly at pebbles in his way.

Johnny didn’t move until Yuta’s figure finally disappeared in the distance, staring out over the horizon and past the retreating steps of his friend. He turned towards Mark, a half-assed smile stretched against his face and not entirely reaching his eyes.

“You hungry?”

They ate dried oatmeal packets for breakfast, boiling the water in Johnny’s camping kettle over the charcoal remains of their fire from the previous night. Yuta had decided to leave before eating, as if he was trying to avoid any prolonged farewells or emotion. Johnny repacked his bag for his trip to Seattle throughout the day silently, sorting through his clothes and organizing various water bottles and ammunition. Mark sat in the corner, fiddling with a pack of cards he had found in the bedside table and trying to ignore the new throbbing in his ankle. He needed to take some more acetaminophen soon.

"Alright. I'll probably try and leave by tomorrow morning – Yuta scouted a car in the parking lot with a half full tank and a living battery. If all goes well, I'll be back within two days at the latest. That is, of course, depending on how much crap is in the outskirts of the city."

Mark nodded, shuffling the stack of cards again for what felt like the thirtieth time. "I'll be here."

"Yeah. You better not try running anywhere. Yuta and I won't be there to shoot any roamers and knock you out if you get into any trouble this time.

"Ahaha." Mark rolled his eyes. Johnny chuckled in response.

It was obvious to Mark that something had drastically shifted in Johnny in the hours since Yuta had left, even though he'd only known the guy now for a couple of days. Their goodbye had felt a lot more _final_ than either had implied... whatever Johnny's business was in Chicago, it didn't seem like there were any plans in motion to return to San Francisco afterwards.

"I, uh...I just want to say thank you again." Mark spoke up softly, glancing to meet Johnny's gaze. "For helping me. And going to Seattle to look around for me. I really appreciate it."

"Eh. I got nothing better to do anyways. Might as well help a lost puppy make it home. One of us, at the least." Johnny responded with a shrug, but his expression showed a grateful acceptance of Mark's words.

Johnny returned exactly two days later. The car he had taken, a banged up older red model, was gone, replaced by another vehicle that had each of the windows shattered clean through. 

Mark had been dozing off on the bed, having been spending most of his time either napping out of boredom or eating cold canned green beans by candlelight for each of his meals. The gentle turning of wheels over cracked concrete had been just loud enough to stir him from his daze. He sprung up, hobbling over to the balcony on his crutch with his stomach spinning with a sickening combination of excitement and anxiety.

His brain had been busy constructing various possible realities as a way to pass the time – he had dreams of Johnny driving up and Mark's parents climbing out of the back seat, rushing up the stairs to their room and immediately wrapping Mark up in the tightest hug imaginable.

Or maybe just Johnny alone, but among his belongings a letter written in his father's steady hand, promising their safety and prayers until Mark could join them in their new safe home within the city limits.

None of these fantasies came true. Johnny pulled up quietly, getting out of the car without saying a word. He looked up at Mark on the balcony, who was desperately clinging to the last shreds of hope in his heart.

Johnny leaned back inside the car, switching on the radio and turning up the sound until it was echoing out of the vehicle and off the walls of the motel. All the radio produced for a moment was thick static, until Johnny evidently found the frequency he was looking for. Mark could once again hear the banging of a door on the bottom floor as the roamer trapped inside was drawn by the noise.

A recorded message was playing in a loop over and over again – a woman's voice, barely speaking louder than a desperate whisper.

_"Today's date... is June 17th. Seattle isn't safe. The sanctuary has been conquered, the city is falling...Infected are everywhere. Do not attempt to enter Seattle! . . . Today's date..."_

Mark's stomach dropped. June 17th. Three days before his family had fled Vancouver. 

They were too late. 

They had always been too late. 

Mark felt his good leg beginning to shake under him, and he quickly hobbled back inside the room to collapse on one of the chairs. He was hyperventilating, his vision whiting out as his chest was crushed under a wave of panic. 

The radio’s ominous message cut off, the monotonous tone replaced by Johnny’s hurried footsteps as he rushed up to the room.

Mark slid off of the chair, having not made it in time to sit before his legs completely gave out. He hit the ground hard, barely registering the fresh ache in his hip as he curled up in terror, tossing his useless crutch to his side.

Johnny busted in moments later, but stopped awkwardly halfway across the room, his hands flexing into fists. He eventually took a couple unsteady steps forward, crouching down next to Mark, who had placed his head between his knees in a desperate attempt to get oxygen back into his lungs even as tears began to pour down his cheeks.

"Mark– Mark, you have to breathe. I need you to breathe." Johnny said authoritatively, resting a hand on top of Mark's head.

" _I can't!_ I can't do it, I can't–" Mark wheezed, hiccuping.

"Yes you _can,_ Mark. Here, put your hands on the top of your head and lean back for me." Johnny gently pulled Mark's head up, pushing his shoulders back against the wall nearest to them and guiding Mark's hands up until they were clenched together above his forehead. Mark felt the tension in his chest begin to loosen with the stretch, and he forced his breathing to slow, trying to match the gentle rhythm of Johnny's counting.

Once Mark's panic had subsided enough that he could let out slow, shaky sighs that whistled through his teeth, Johnny stood and got a kleenex box from their supply closet. He gently wiped under Mark's eyes and across his cheekbones, cleaning off the tears that were now dried salt on his skin. Once he was finished, and convinced that Mark was no longer on the verge of total collapse, Johnny distanced himself and sat across from him, leaning against the edge of the bed.

"What happened?" Mark asked, his voice cracked and quiet.

"I don't know, Mark." Mark looked up at him through clumpy lashes and noticed how absolutely exhausted Johnny was, eyes rimmed by dark circles and hair limp and greasy with dried sweat.

"I couldn't even get close to the city walls with the car – there were hundreds of roadblocks made of other junked cars, barbed wire and pikes...and bodies. So many bodies of infected that tried getting close and got caught up in the wire. There were also tons of banners hanging off of the walls, all saying what you told me. ' _Sanctuary City', 'All Welcome to Gate 3'_ , various slogans. So I traced my way around the wall to Gate 3, and no one was there. Not a soul in the guard towers, no active checkpoint, nothing."

Mark hugged his legs to his chest, resting his chin on his knees and shutting his eyes as he tried to breathe quietly through his nose. Johnny continued.

"It was getting dark, so I camped out in an abandoned trailer. It was full of shift schedules, code sheets, walkie-talkies that had long run out of battery. Everything was covered in dust...like it had been months since anyone was in there. When the sun came up, I climbed up a fire escape on the side of the wall to get a look inside, just in case I could see anyone. There was no movement, no lights, no smoke. Except for one zombie wandering down some distant side street. If there's anyone still in the city, they've barricaded themselves further inside ages ago. No one's gotten through that gate in a while."

"But–” Mark couldn’t keep himself from cutting Johnny off, desperate for actual answers. “Did you see a white bus anywhere? With British Columbian plates?"

"No, Mark. I didn't. But, again, I went down maybe two ways into the city..."

"Then they could be fine, right? They could've picked up the radio transmission and started heading south again, maybe down to California or something..."

"Mark. There was no getting past Seattle. Not that I saw."

“ _You don’t know that._ You can’t– you just said you tried, what, two entrances into the city? If you saw the banners they would have seen them too! They’re not gone. They’ve gone somewhere else, they must have.” Mark argued back, his tone sharp with hysteria. He felt _angry, so fucking angry–_ angry at being left behind, angry for the choices he had to make, angry that his supposed safe haven and his family were now gone without a trace. 

Johnny put his hands up in surrender, evidently letting Mark work through this explosion of grief – however, the placating gesture just increased the fire in Mark’s gut until he felt like he was seething with rage. For days now he’d been looked at with nothing but pity and sadness, treated like a lost dog who’s been kicked too many times.

“Stop it! Shut up! You don’t know anything! They’re still alive, they’re _fine_ , they’re waiting for me… just because you’re too stupid to figure a way into or aroud the city doesn’t mean they were!” Mark screamed, his face twisted into a snarl as his cheeks burned with fury.

Johnny looked stunned, his eyes quickly steeling. “What the fuck? I’m just telling you what I saw, Mark. I don’t know how the _hell_ you are somehow making this situation _my fault_ –”

 _“It is your fault!_ If you had just left me alone in Everett, instead of dragging me here, I could’ve made it to Seattle in time to meet up with them! What if they came back for me on the highway, and I wasn’t there? Instead I’m sitting in here all day, healing injuries I shouldn’t fucking have, because you couldn’t just leave me alone!”

There was no denying it now – Johnny was pissed. The tension in his expression alone would’ve been enough to run shivers down Mark’s spine had he not also been seething. Johnny stood, looming over Mark with clenched fists. Mark flinched, curling in tighter to the wall.

“You were going to fucking _die_ if Yuta and I hadn’t saved your sorry ass out there on the street – do not try and twist the situation otherwise. We save you, we feed you, we waste our medical supplies on you, and you now have the _nerve_ to throw everything back in my fucking face? Do you know what a risk it was just carrying you back here?” Johnny was yelling through gritted teeth, shaking his head in disbelief. He slammed his foot on the floor – there was a corresponding snarl and screech from downstairs.

“It’s the fucking _end of the world_ , Mark, in case you’ve forgotten. People are eating other people! Same shit almost happened to you. And what makes you feel so confident that you would’ve survived otherwise? You could barely handle _two_ infected, much less a horde. You won’t even use your fucking gun!” Johnny stopped, huffing loudly through his nose and unclenching his fists. When he opened his mouth to speak again, the unbridled anger seemed to be more controlled. He crouched down to face Mark.

“The truth of it is, Mark, that everyone is losing someone. Everyone is dying. Could your family be alive? Maybe. But you said it yourself – you were traveling with no supplies, not even water, in a bus full of children and the elderly. And, you have the only gun.” Standing again, Johnny walked over to the door, grabbing his backpack off the floor and pulling it over his shoulder.

“I went and looked for you. I told you what I saw. Here’s the reality of the fucking situation. Try being fucking grateful.” And with that final sentence, he marched out of the room, slamming the door shut behind him with a bang. A few moments later, the engine of the car roared to life, the tires squealing on the pavement as Johnny took off. 

Mark slid down further until he was splayed out flat on his back. He stared up at the ceiling, and cried. 

Johnny didn’t come back for hours. The noon light scattered throughout the room quickly faded into dusk, and then vanished into the pitch black void of night. Mark couldn’t bring himself to light all the candles, instead barely managing to switch on the lantern. Somewhere outside, an owl hooted quietly. Mark tried to smother his fear that he had just been completely abandoned.

Rationally, he knew that all of their supplies were still in the room, including the vast majority of Johnny’s belongings. Therefore, he had to come back. 

But Mark could barely swallow around the lump of guilt in his throat, the corresponding nausea in his gut. He’d just possibly ruined the only connection he had left in the world, even if it was just an acquaintance. An acquaintance who had unnecessarily saved his life, only for Mark to turn around and spit in his face. If Johnny just left Mark, supplies be damned, Mark knew that he deserved it. 

The terror of being alone is a horrific one, the type to paralyze all your limbs and make even the sky feel both smothering and intangibly distant. Isolation was never something that Mark had experienced – the concept of a solitary existence was suddenly too real. He no longer had a family. He no longer had friends. He had no idea where to go, or what to do.

Eventually Mark fell into a haze, still curled up on the floor but staring up at the steady, artificial glow of the lantern. He’d been so caught up in his circling thoughts that he almost missed the soft rumble of machinery that heralded the return of a car in the motel’s parking lot. He sat up quickly, craning his ears to make out the gentle click of a shutting car door, the muffled and dragging steps that betrayed the exhaustion of the one walking up the stairs. 

The door swung open quietly. Johnny stepped inside, glanced once at Mark, and immediately went to the closet to hang up his pack. Mark’s mouth felt dry.

“I’m sorry–” They both turned and spoke at the exact same moment, each staring at one another like a deer caught in headlights. Johnny gestured for Mark to continue speaking.

“I...I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to get angry at you. Not after everything you and Yuta have done for me. I had no right to.”

“Nah, man, just…” Johnny sighed, crossing the room and once again sitting across from Mark. He pulled a cigarette box out of his pocket, placing one in between his teeth. Lighting it with a match from the box on the table, Johnny took one slow drag blowing the smoke up towards the ceiling. All the tension in his shoulders disappeared. 

“I shouldn’t have lost my shit back at you. Not after the news you’d just heard, the realization of it all. That was shitty of me.” He took another deep inhale from the cig, letting his eyes drift shut for a moment. 

“I deserved it.”

“No. You didn’t. You’re a kid who just found out that your parents are dead.”

Mark dropped his gaze to the floor. His chest ached. His eyes stung, but he’d run out of tears hours ago.

“I just...wanted to apologize anyway. And thank you again. For taking care of me. For going to Seattle.”

Johnny watched silently through half-lidded eyes. His gaze was relaxed, and he gave a gentle nod in response.

Mark fiddled with the hem of his hoodie, pulling at a loose thread. “I think I can probably leave in a week, maybe...my ankle feels a lot better already. So I’ll be out of your hair.”

Johnny seemed to have been taken by surprise. “Leave? To where?”

“I figured that maybe I’d head back up to Vancouver. At least I know some people there. If the city’s still standing.”

“Vancouver? Mark, you’re a fugitive deserter. Wouldn’t they just shoot you?”

Mark couldn’t help the short incredulous laugh that burst out of his mouth. “What other option do I have?”

There was a moment of silence. Johnny stubbed out his cigarette on the carpet.

“You could stay with me.”

For a second, Mark was sure he had just misheard. “What?”

“You. Can. Stay. With. Me.” Johnny smiled, a little shrewdly. “A spot just opened up, after all.”

“Even after today? After what I said?” Mark’s heart was racing all over again, for what felt like the thirtieth time today.

“Mark, trust me. It’s fine. If you want to stick around, that’s no problem. Having a friend is better than being alone. Come to Chicago with me.” 

Mark was struck dumb, mouth opening and closing on reflex as he couldn’t think of anything eloquent to say. Eventually he gave up, bobbing his head and replying with a simple “Ok.”

Johnny grinned, his teeth flashing in the lantern’s glow. He stretched out his hand, the open palm an open invitation.

Mark shoke it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tadada! the plot continues on with the new partnership of johnny and mark. 
> 
> if you enjoyed or just want to let me know what you thought of this chapter, please drop either a kudos or a comment below! dialogue isn't my strong suit when it comes to writing, so i hope it wasn't too awkward to read through!
> 
> for updates on my writing process, random wips and related thoughts + my cc, you can find me on twitter at lueurvacillante !
> 
> ty for reading!


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